Evolution

 

Methinks it is strange indeed, 250,000

years of archaeological history from

caveman art portrayed on cavernous

dwelling walls, to petroglyph carvings

by prehistoric native Americans.

The Egyptians, of course, gave us their

pictorial hieroglyphs to decipher. And

with all these images throughout the

development of mankind, given all of

our scientific and biological advance-

ments, we have arrived for the first

time at a seminal period of time in

our illustrious evolution—

The creation of singular, stand-alone

images which depict our innermost

emotions. Ladies and gentleman, I

present to you the “emoji”—Rhetor-

ically speaking, I submit to you, my,

how advanced are we?

                      -30-

Chris Hanch 4-15-2021

A Proclamation?

 

Not to worry, boredom and the drudgery

of routine will not last. I am here today

to assure you, change is on the way, a

new day will break.

Now, will all the ills of the world be swept

away? We have our hopes and dreams, but

as we have seen, history can go either way.

Hope, I say, hope and dreams for something

better and more robust, I pray. Have faith and

believe in yourself, changes can be made.

Necessity is the Mother of Invention, they

say. It’s up to you. Make one positive move

you believe in happen today. Answer the call

or make it. Either way, let your music play.

No grandiose proclamations, I’m only preaching

to myself.

                         -30-

Chris Hanch 4-14-2021

Legacy of Mankind

 

In our lives we have done some things

our parents and grandparents never did.

In our lives we have been places never

before gone or seen.

One after another, all of us in our lifetimes

followed the line of succession as we were

prescribed by nature to do. Mother, father,

parents, grand and great, behaved the laws

of biology and mortality as the science

commands.

We studied, learned and grew into a world

given our relative and respective place in

time, were given a particular signature DNA

lineage passed along to us and our progeny.

We share many biological and psychological

traits.

So much in a lifetime done, each and everyone,

features and traditions passed along. Avenues old

and new for each of us to explore and pursue.

My, how things have changed over time; my,

how some things remain ever the same. Each

of us remembered individually and specifically

by definition and name.

The deceased shall remain ever alive within us.

The unbroken chain of generations remain. You

and I have done some things our forefathers and

foremothers never in their lifetimes could have

done, but were destined to be handed down the

line for you and me.

This is the legacy of humankind. Pass it along.

                   -30-

Chris Hanch 4-19-2021

Life's Riddle, a Mystery

 

I forget sometimes,

and as I have grown older

I have a harder time remembering

things—names of people, songs,

dates, movies and such.

On the end table next to my

recliner in the living room

I keep an unorganized pile of

scrap paper on which I make

little notes to myself, a few

words scribbled randomly

as I recall what it is my

memory has lost or

will inevitably forget…

pay rent, chicken breasts,

Wandavision, Band of Brothers,

Chuck Berry, It wasn’t me, Dreams,

Stevie Nicks, Ibuprofen, Amber, VA,

10 AM Wednesday, Air Supply,

Making Love Out of Nothing at All,

Earl Foster, Mike Wagner, Iris

DeMent, Easy’s Getting Harder

Every Day, 265019113, Joyful

Noise, Greatest Showman, Call Ange,

Gene Wilder, Imagine Dragon,

Faces and Places, a Celebration of

Humanity, Marlboro Light 100s,

Evergy, Pierucci, Frank and Louise

Vasquez, Call Consuella, Mannheim

Steam Roller, Verizon, 888-294-6804,

Anthropocene, Pangaea, and so, and so,

and so…

Small, odd -sized scraps of paper,

notes written up and down, sideways,

perpendicular, parallel, horizontal,

vertical, every which way, a grab bag

of disarray. Hundreds of notes, jotted

down randomly as they pop back into

my conscious memory.

No one but I hold the age-old answers

to the riddle my life has come to be, even

for me sometimes a mystery.

                  -30-

Chris Hanch 4-12-2021

Baby Steps

A ten-month old baby

sits on the floor surrounded

by wooden blocks.

The baby picks up one

block at a time, fixes its

eyes on the cube, twists

it round and round in its

hands not knowing

what to make of such

a thing.

Baby puts the block

down and reaches

for another, a different

color, different forms

pressed into all sides.

(You and I would

recognize these as

alphabet blocks,

each one with a

different raised letter

on all-6 sides.

Baby is fascinated,

each block a different

letter, yet each block

similar in shape and

size.

Although the baby

is surrounded by

26-blocks, each

with a letter from

A to Z, baby has no

concept yet of numbers

or letters of the alphabet.

When it comes time

will baby be the one to

question what all these

blocks with different

images mean or will

a parent or sibling

tell her about letters

of the alphabet, about

how each letter when

combined with other

letters spell words and

words are what we

read and speak as

human beings to learn

and communicate?

A Thought arises.

Oh my, how complicated

this existence and the

newly found self-awareness

of me seems to be.

So many questions and

answers, all beginning

and completed with these

26-letters from A to Z

in planned and sequential

combinations are needed to

know before learning anything.

The word to describe this

process with which to begin,

baby is told to “memorize.”

At first, one must “memorize.”

How on God’s Green Earth

will baby ever learn all

there is to know when

I don’t even know

what “men-o-size” means?

The word is “mem-o-rize”

not “men-o-size.”

One must begin with A, B, C…

Eventually you shall learn,

baby is told. Then you will

understand how mankind

to which species you belong

eventually got to the moon.

Yeah right, ten-month old baby

thinks, everyone knows only a

jumping cow can do that.

            -30-

Chris Hanch 4-9-2021

 

Current State of Affairs, an Update

 

On Sunday in two days

I will have lived through

my first week since turning

seventy-four, a milestone

for me as was living my

days at seventy-three.

Of course there were all

those days and years

before which each in

it’s own rite was a new

personal record for me.

Each passing day and

year brought new reve-

lations and experiences,

although mostly the

muddled mass of time

and place cannot be

pinpointed specifically.

I cannot say on which

particular day I noticed

my first gray hair or

when or where I was

when the wrinkles over-

took my fair-skinned

youthful look. My

testosterone wasn’t

kind enough to leave

me a note when it

abandoned me.

Close as I can pinpoint

a physical decline would

be when my downhill slide

became noticeable to me

sometime after age sixty.

I have carried my bag

of ailments from each

year thereafter with

interest compounded

annually into my

seventy-fourth year.

And I’d be a damned

fool to expect things

to remain the same

or get any better

from here.

As far as my mental

state of affairs goes,

well I must say, it

never was in top-notch

shape in the first place.

However, here is a

shining light of hope

for me, until my dying

days, my erratic and

teeter-totter mental

state is likely one fewer

thing I have to worry

and bitch about.

        -30-

Chris Hanch 4-9-2021

Choices Again

 

No revelations this morning,

nothing new of consequence

to say.

Considered posting a repeat of an

older poem, but not even that

appealed to me.

Not for certain what’s for diner

later. Have several choices yet

to make.

I figure for the most part,

life is just that way—simply

boring, mostly routine

the same.

Creativity comes and goes

as the river of life flows.

Even those images have been

used countless times before.

Today, as with each and every

day before somewhere out there

history will be made.

I’ll wait and see, perhaps egg

salad and soup for dinner tonight

will do.

Could be, today shall

remain nothing ventured,

nothing gained.

I look at it this way,

Beethoven and van Gogh haven’t

come up with anything new in

years either.

At least, as I live and breathe,

I still have a few choices left

to make.

           -30-

Chris Hanch 4-9-2021