Day Three in Siem Reap

By: Anna Cates, Wilmington, Ohio
and Steve Van Allen, Cincinnati, Ohio

A kilometer from Ankor Wat, at Ta Prohm, a Mahayana 12th century Buddhist temple.  Huge fig trees hang over the temple and spread across the ground. Moss grows green over the temple stones.

I walk around the walls and note three young saffron-robed monks sitting around a campfire. They call out, “Sok subai,” and wave. I wave back and walk on.

When I get back to my driver, I ask what the phrase means.  He says, “Are you happy?”

In decades since, I have often wondered, am I happy?

The US fell to 23rd in the World Happiness Index last year.

moon’s halo
melancholy blue
memories

MAID*

By Anna Cates
Wilmington, Ohio, USA

. . . and she wilts like wet paper,

her watercolor life bleeding pink

across unfinished pages,

the faintest pink, like the weakest sunset,

where purple fails and pales, thinning,

her voice, their voices, mortal voices,

angel voices, demon voices, choices,

choices, such agonizing choices . . .

        fragrant
        chrysanthemums . . .
        prayer threads

*Medical Assistance in Dying, Canada’s euthanasia program, legal since 2016 and expanded in 2021 to include those suffering without foreseeable death.  

Insurance?

By Steve Van Allen – Cincinnati, Ohio, USA, Earth
Anna Cates – Wilmington, Ohio, USA

Sugar-Pie is third in line at the pharmacy, six feet behind number two.  As she walks down the allergy aisle, she often wonders if her mother cursed her into diabetes.

The pharmacy is busy; it always is.  Finally, “Can I help you?”

“My name is Sugar-Pie.  I have one prescription to pick up. My birthday is August 14.”

“Here it is.  That will be $280.”

She feels faint and holds onto the counter.  “It was $40 last month!”

“You are into your donut hole.  Spend another $8,000 and you will be back to $40.”

Sugar-pie stares at the pharmacist, turns around, and spends her $40 on candy.

autumn moon
warm aromas
of home

*According to the Congressional Budget Office, 92% of Americans are insured. That leaves 26 million with no health insurance, and often insured have a donut hole.

Health Insurance Coverage Projections For The US Population And Sources Of Coverage, By Age, 2024–34 (healthaffairs.org)

Understanding the Medicare Part D Donut Hole (verywellhealth.com)

Plastic Apocalypse

By Anna Cates
Wilmington, Ohio, USA

“Doomsday is quite within our reach, if we will only stretch for it.”
—Loudon Wainwright III

Time moves counterclockwise to heal the breach.
Do we dare to name it, to face what we betray?
Toxic world; do we dare to eat a peach?
Time moves counterclockwise to heal the breach
While those who long for doomsday reach—
The fruition of our blunder, Orwellian, they say.
Time moves counterclockwise to heal the breach.
Do we dare to name it, to face what we betray?

golden tones
of a seaside sparrow
who will listen?

Ode to the Dragon Rider

By Anna Cates
Wilmington, Ohio, USA

I have panted for green places
standing before statues:
admirable men to questionable men
mortals on horses, Confederate generals
to conquistadors, cowboy cliches, Marlboro Men
of deceptive advertising, the old and ugly
even the beautiful, masterfully chiseled cold stone
or too hot to touch in record-breaking heat
leaving a thirst for boundless verdancy
an infinity of flowers and trees, a land
of clear water and skies, for you and me
and every peaceful Ferdinand.*

Ride fiery dawn
on a monstrous snake
with wings!

*In Munro Leaf’s children’s classic, The Story of Ferdinand (1936), the peace-loving bull, who preferred smelling flowers to bullfights.

To Each Their Own

By Anna Cates
Wilmington, Ohio, USA

version of justice
image of god
prayers at dusk
on either side of invisible lines
shifting left or right
at the whim of strong men
muscling pawns . . .
they aren’t so mean, are they?

a white butterfly
enters his dream—  
the fallen trooper

The Iconoclasm of Artifice

by Edward Cates and Anna Cates

To me, ancient ruins
Are always preferable
To stark metropolitan glitz

Let me see the places
Where time has seeped into
Lichen-wreathed stonework
Appreciating nature’s revulsion
At the angular excesses of man
Set my soul free to dance
Where the wild winds whistle
Untamed through empty panes
Let my tired heart again savor  
The taste of reclamation

There is oft more beauty
In where man once was
Than where he yet remains
Artistry in tumbledown ruins
Deciphered by nature’s pen
Transcribing life onto bricks
In fantastical, kenopsic verse
Teach us to love her poetry
Let our hearts learn to exult in
The iconoclasm of artifice

antique land
eroded strand revealing
the cairn . . .

poised like the sphinx
on the vibrant sands . . .
desert lynx

sunset
wind whispers
the mystery