{"id":4554,"date":"2015-09-02T21:55:47","date_gmt":"2015-09-02T21:55:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/?p=4554"},"modified":"2015-09-02T21:55:47","modified_gmt":"2015-09-02T21:55:47","slug":"whittlers-lament-a-poem-by-ron-olsen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/whittlers-lament-a-poem-by-ron-olsen\/","title":{"rendered":"Whittler’s Lament. A Poem by Ron Olsen"},"content":{"rendered":"

 
\n 
\nHe sat on the stoop
\nWhittling
\nOne stick
\nAfter another
\nWhittling away
\nUntil they were gone
\n 
\nPausing only to spit on the wet stone
\nTo sharpen the blade
\nWithout it
\nHe would be finished
\n 
\nHis mind waltzed from one vagary to another
\nPossessed by some brazen demon of old
\nWithout defined purpose or cause
\nKnowing only that he had been left behind
\nWithout a partner in the dance
\n 
\nThey laughed at his plight
\nHis suffering
\nHis brain turning to rose colored granite
\nShe had so loved the smooth face of the granite
\nAnd cool spring nights at the graveyard
\nTruly alone
\nAt last
\n 
\nHe had taken his shot and missed
\nAnd now
\nSneering at the children in the street
\nWith their catcalls
\nTheir pranks
\nTiny cheerful idiots
\nHe was unable to remember
\nHis need that went begging
\nBefore the haze came
\nAnd the whittling started
\n 
\nNow there was only the blade
\nWorking its way
\nThrough the pile of twigs
\nOne switch at a time
\nUntil they were gone
\nHis pain dulled
\nMomentarily
\nOnce again
\nBy a job well done
\n 
\n\u00a92015 Ron Olsen – all rights reserved<\/strong>
\n 
\nRon Olsen is a Peabody and Emmy award winning journalist based in Southern California. He is recently retired from the Tribune Company, where he was stationed at the Los Angeles Times, working with the newspaper’s writers and editors to adapt newspaper stories for KTLA-TV. He is the author of more than one-thousand essays and an occasional poem. His essays have been published by several local papers in the Los Angeles area. He began writing poetry just recently. He says he loves the craft of saying more with fewer words, with each word playing a significant role in the piece. “I am sometimes struck by my poetry”
\nhe says.”I’ll look at what I’ve written and wonder where it came from-some wellspring that’s beyond my understanding. What a strange and wonderful process.”<\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nA more complete bio can be found here –
\nhttps:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ron_Olsen<\/a>
\nhttp:\/\/workingreporter.com\/wordpress\/a-question-of-priorities\/ <\/a>
\nor at his blog at
\nhttp:\/\/workingreporter.com\/wordpress<\/a> or his Facebook page at
\nhttps:\/\/www.facebook.com\/workingreporter?ref=bookmarks<\/a><\/strong>
\n 
\n 
\nrobin@artvilla.com<\/a>
\nPoetryLifeTimes<\/a>
\nPoetry Life & Times<\/a><\/strong>
\neditor@artvilla.com<\/a>
\nwww.artvilla.com<\/a>
\nArtvilla.com<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

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    He sat on the stoop Whittling One stick After another Whittling away Until they were gone   Pausing only to spit on the wet stone To sharpen the blade Without it He would be finished   His mind waltzed from one vagary to another Possessed by some brazen demon of old Without defined … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4454,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43,631],"tags":[18,136,3],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4554"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4554"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4554\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4556,"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4554\/revisions\/4556"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4554"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4554"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4554"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}