DUANE ANDERSON - POEMS

Duane currently lives in La Vista, NE, and volunteers with the American Red Cross as a Donor Ambassador on their blood drives.  He has had poems published in Poetry Quarterly, Fine Lines, The Sea Letter, Cholla Needles, Wilderness House Literary Review, Adelaide Literary Magazine and several other publications.

​One-Time Used Recipe

​My wife handed me a new recipe
having recently printed it from the internet,
wanting me to try fixing something different
from what we usually eat for dinner.
I went to the store
purchased all the necessary ingredients
and gave it my best attempt
in creating this masterpiece for the palate.


After dinner,
there is no mention
about liking the dish or not,
instead, complaints are heard about having to
wash so many pans, dishes, and utensils,
though it was wasn’t a recipe where
one could throw everything into a crock pot,
sit back down and relax until it was finished.
Then came the complaints about the smell in the house,
that it was terrible,
even though the recipe
called for red onions and garlic.


I replied advising her
not to bother printing out any
additional mouth watering recipes in the future.
Going forward,
we will just eat healthy frozen dinners.
The variety of meals she craves
is right there in the frozen section
at our local grocery store,
besides, using the microwave,
is something right up my alley,
and not to mention,
the clean up and stink are minimal.

The Adventures of the Crooked Walker
​

​Each morning I see her as I walk my dog.
I call her the crooked walker.
She, in her purple top and black shorts,
never altering her outfit from day to day.
She walks forward
going from one side of the sidewalk
to the other side
as she does her daily walk.


I vary the route I take
when I am walking my dog.
She walks the same route
the same six blocks
back and forth multiple times
though I am never around long enough
to tally the count.


My mind wanders
as I walk,
wondering if she ever had gotten
pulled over by the police while driving her car,
and if the officer asked her
to walk a straight line,
could she do it?

​She Was a Pain in the Neck

​She was a pain in the neck from time to time
but still, I loved her.
She was the dog our daughter wanted
eight years ago,
something I wasn’t quite ready for again
after having three other dogs prior to her.


Yes, she barked at almost anything,
paper bags in a neighbor’s yard,
squirrels and rabbits nearby,
a vehicle parked in the neighbor’s driveway
or on the street
that she was not familiar with,
someone ringing the doorbell
or another dog getting a walk as
she looked out the window.


She was always begging for treats,
although she did not always get them.
She would yip
when smelling the scent
of some animal no longer in the yard.
We would go on walks
two to three times a day,
though they were at her pace
because she had to sniff everything around.


Each time she heard another dog bark outside
she was constantly wanting to go in and out
the door to the backyard
wanting to see what was going on.
She would sit on the rug in front of the
kitchen sink while we washed the dishes,
requiring us to stand at some weird angle
to complete that task.


But now that she can no longer walk
and is in such pain
I wish for those times to return.
Yes, she was a pain in the butt sometimes,
but I loved her so very much.            

​A New Normal

​I sat in a hallway of a large food company,
which sitting in a hallway
was nothing unusual for this job.
On the wall across from where I sat,
a television was turned on
showing commercials of some of their products,
from sunflower seeds, pies, jerky,
fajitas, popcorn, frozen dinners,
along with a few recipes using some of their products.
They ran the small selection of their products,
interspersed between a few public relations items,
over and over and over again,
repeating each one every fifteen minutes,
in a continuous loop.
I pretty much had everything all memorized
as I sat there for six straight hours.


Maybe it wasn‘t their intention
for anyone to sit in the hallway
for six hours in front of that screen,
but as it turned out,
it was a form of torture
and I will never be the same.
After that day, my wife had me committed,
and now I wear a straight jacket,
watching Looney Tunes cartoons all day long.
It is my new life, my new normal,
living here with the others in my new home.