20151101 (neuroscience)

Evolutionary theory tells us it’s

No surprise whale newborns know

How to swim the ones who don't

Die off before reproducing or

That fawns horses soon run walk

For the same reason neural paths

For balance motion wriggling

In water must be inhered in the 

Genetic material passed on

Babes don’t even stumble about

Until months after not that our 

Legs could support us so we think

Those paths form from random

Movements though that’s not 

Proven neuronal channels exist

‘Twixt the muscles control centers 

Without coordination that hand eye 

Thing that’s so much fun to watch 

Develop in our young then fine 

Motor skills like picking up 

Shards of a vase knocked off 

An end table while learning to walk 

We’re nowhere able to fend off

Wolves or tongue-kisses of those

Slathering hounds we keep about

As doorbells bedwarmers tricksters

Who perform as instructed long

Before we can steady on our feet 

Our puppyhood is years in the making

So more complex dogs don’t 

Eventually speak English nor will

Cats do simple math you’ll waste 

Your time reading stories to pigs 

Even if all the characters are pigs 

But children can grasp dogs as

Characters as easily as children 

Whom they’ve never met in

Tales from which they learn not

To trust wolves even if they’re

Wearing grandma’s clothes

Elbows we think don’t think

About elbows or marvel of their

Flexions twists but brains have

Been thinking about brains since

God knows when perhaps when 

Oog first bashed Moog in the head 

Changed him drastically but unlike

Cain didn’t kill him or at least since

Phineas Gage in Vermont in 1848

Blew a dynamite tamping bar 

Through his cranium lived years to

Tell of it although we have known

Cave peoples had been trephining

Each others’ skulls in prehistory

In 1954 Doctor Robert Galbraith

Heath implanted electrodes into the 

Pleasure centers of his patient’s brain

With a button the subject would 

Electrically stimulate it as many

As fifteen hundred times in three hours 

Complained begged for more when

It was disconnected years earlier mice

Hooked up similarly starved to death

Rather than give up the trigger

Somewhere in laboratories stuff

This fascinating must still be done

But except for a reference to CIA

Military research I haven’t found it

c. J.S.Manista, 2015

20151031 (Halloween Scare)

Halloween was once a neighborhood event

You didn’t drive your kids to a better

Area so they’d reap more crap

Kids improvised costumes jeans  

Red kerchief cowboy hat toy 

Six shooter Voila buckaroo 

An old sheet with cut eyeholes 

An instant ghost Jean sewed 

Witches’ capes hats mouse costumes 

Pumpkin suits with cardboard acrylics

Andy made the sword shield and

Buckler for Hagar the Horrible

The Indian was the last costume Jean

Made passed down to Peter that year 

We lived in Cleveland Heights 

On Tullamore Road near the

High school we’d bought a house

Between two black families naive

Believers in integration stability

Our street was about half and half

Knew almost everybody they’d

Watched our kids grow from babies

Either Jean or I would walk them

Up one side back down the other

Fifty houses avoiding unlit porches 

Uniform signal of not participating 

Still their plastic pumpkins at the end

Returned laden with snackies candies

Pennies maybe a piece of fruit I’d

Taken the kids ‘round that year we’d

Made jack o’lanterns for the porch

Steps Jean had a large metal mixing

Bowl full of goodies to reward scary

Boogers coming back the pumpkins

Had been smashed against the stone

Steps shattered shards hurled against 

The door Jean was inside shaking

The bowl almost empty teen boys

Had come just in regular clothes 

Demanded candy Jean told them

No costume no goodies closed the 

Door heard them screaming as they

Kicked the pumpkins apart and 

Threw the pieces at the door

We didn’t think to report what

They'd done chalked it up to

Boorish sorry ass teen behavior 

Cleaned it up glad it hadn’t 

Been worse next day

I came home Jean was crying 

She had just shared it with our 

Neighbor who had two young girls

Asked why didn’t you just 

Give them the candy Jean said 

Because they wore no costumes 

And they were rude you didn’t 

Treat them they gave you their trick

I told them if they came back 

Dressed in old clothes as hoboes 

Or something I’d give them candy

Without a glimmer of sympathy she said

It was because they were black then

Smugly walked back to her house

Living together we decided will

Take a lot more than just living

Side by side

c. J.S.Manista, 2015

20151030 (cold, gray, rainy, Cleveland days)

Robert Russell Rhodes House 1872 today across Franklin 

Manista's Folly also 1872 but on a sunny blue sky day

Cleveland gets more sun than Germany

Which is odd since Germany has many

More buildings with rooftop solar than

Cleveland if I had to label our city I

Would not use the term sunny clear

Bright more often I compared our skies

To concrete block gray with wetness

Thrown in more often than not we can

Keep a shallow great lake filled with 

Rain runoff Niagara notwithstanding

I don’t think my gray opinion is 

Widely subscribed perhaps I don’t

Get invested enough in the outdoor

Activities which are aplenty I’m

Told I remember once years ago 

Waiting for a dental appointment

Scanning some industrial promotion

Magazine which I didn’t recognize

At first although everything seemed

So familiar turned out to be a listing

With pictures of the many businesses

Belonging to the Greater Cleveland

Growth Association all photos taken

On sunny blue days what a strain

On architectural photographers that 

Must have been chasing around

The area trying to get dramatic

Images on the few days the sun

Sky cooperated did they fly them

In from all over the country my youth

Comes to me as walking from 

My home to school a blur of 

Boots rubbers raincoats umbrellas

Hopping over sidewalk puddles

Staying inside for recess riding the 

Bus to high school in the rain

Uncomfortably wrapped sweating

On a humid bus to get out for a 

Brisk hustle to the entrance then

Jamming it all in a narrow locker

Hoping to keep the water from

Dripping on my books some 

Boys wore only light jackets didn’t

Mind their hair getting wet I went 

To a boys' Catholic prep couple of 

Swipes with a comb their DAs

Were drying I suffered hat hair 

The term hadn’t been coined yet

The brothers who taught us had a

Thirty foot door-to-door from their

Living quarters to the school many

Strode impervious to the weather

With their notebooks clutched 

Under their double-breasted black

Jackets hankie to the glasses at

The desk they were ready to teach

Not quite sure why images of 

Rain so quickly run to school

Experiences pre-college our

Climate couldn’t have changed

That much college thoughts 

Almost always involve trudging

Through snow to the 

Parking lot where I’d 

Meet a friend who drove all 

The rest were hot humid marches

In itchy woolen ROTC uniforms

The easy breezy days are up there

Somewhere too easy too breezy

To create memories

c. J.S.Manista, 2015