Leah’s Trunk

A Work in Progress
30

Cord wood split and stacked while green

in May while waiting for news from town

Leah’s hair tied up in a yellow scarf

the color of fresh hewn alder

wood smoke scenting sunlight

sunlight ageing alder

finches perched on thistles

spreading thistledown

Donal was advised to avoid green suits

in business if you want to make them buy

dress for success with dark suit and tie

don’t wear clothes from which buyers will shy

northern harriers hunting a marsh

redwing blackbirds nesting in cattails

cutthroat trout in the shallow stream

a kingfisher by the pond near the beach

longer days warmer weather

emergent bumble bees

daffodils hyacinths

house finches warbling

well-seasoned wood

a year quickly past

Leah’s cabin now vacant

Still no news from town

We bought a trunk from Leah

for she was traveling light

leaving to live with an artist

down the coast and out of state

a capacious blue trunk

for toys and winter clothes

a platform for a doll’s house

for tea parties for scones

then came news that Boeing would buy

a seven-million-dollar list price deal 

for a Cray Research Cray-1

with full commission being quite a sum

wood smoke scenting sunlight

sunlight ageing alder

finches perched on thistles

spreading thistledown

after a dry spell it rained

plants that weathered well thrived

sudden growth seemed obvious

as if Persephone unbuttoned her blouse

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                     2025

Origins

A Work in Progress
29

I’ll close my eyes on a rainy day and choose a sun drenched cricket field edged by shade trees where leather meets willow and there’s watercress not far and a brook where a nymph lives that should a cricketer come in search of a hard hit ball he might spy it at the bottom of a deep pool that should he reach in to grasp would be too far for an arm to reach and she’d soon have him in her grasp

While fronds ripple in the splash

And find young Donal on his little bike riding pell-mell into the park through the wrought iron gates to fling himself down on the grass inside and hide behind his bike from the police car stopped outside the gates he’d just whizzed in front of risking scratch of paint

Sing to me muse as once you sang 

tell of Penelope in a nightie telling her son

he never slept, Odysseus, he never slept

with pajama bottoms on

So, Donal’s mother told him one day his father slept

but he had died. He felt unhugged afraid of touch 

flinching from contact with her skin

his mother's love had not outlasted him

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                     2025

Where Walt Whitman Walked

A Work in Progress
28

So Donal came to stand on land where Whitman may have walked

where he and Jean Bartik sometimes walked and talked

by the Cooper River across the street from where Donal worked

as Editor: Standard Electronic Data Processing

in time to see how it all began with those

who were programmers, coders

Donal carpooled with Jean

one of ENIAC’s team of programmers

all of them women 

Americans working with male engineers

She, Jean Bartik nee Betty Jean Jennings was an Editor 

at Auerbach Publishers across the river from Philadelphia

in Pennsauken, New Jersey beyond Camden

by the Cooper River 

And ENIAC claimed being first

And once upon a time the Cray-1 was undoubtedly the fastest

built by wirers, all of them women

Americans working with male engineers

So Donal learned to write for money

Auerbach Reports on mainframe computers

got to see how it was done

emergent from an archive of previous work

Cray’s short vector machine 

the world’s fastest computer by far

And Donal got a job at Cray Research, Inc.

and was there to witness Seymour himself

on a Saturday at the punch card machine

at the Halle Lab in Chippewa Falls

and in time got a transcript of his recorded talk

explaining a tool which measured nanoseconds 

in short strides of wire

delay lines running back and forth across the board

synchronizing signals

interconnecting simple electronic parts

obtained from Fairchild and Motorola

to mathematicians

famous at wrangling data breaking codes

there in the puzzle palace where a red flight flashed

when Donal went down to the basement where a multitude

of computers were arrayed

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                    2025

Glenn Hughes Began Another Screenplay

A Work in Progress
27

Let’s assume that by 1958 Glenn Hughes had read Isaac Asimov’s Foundation trilogy, published in 1951, 52, and 53.  From this came his idea for another screenplay where an older building on the campus of the University of Washington was the hub of a secret in plain sight, another type of Second Foundation dedicated to the survival of the human species.  A place where scholars kept in touch with ancient texts and philosophers, a place of great learning and patient understanding, a place where civilization would be saved when…

Donal sat on the steps of Denny Hall and sang while playing his guitar...

When you’ve been trumped, you cannot play for time

for your cards have been moved to another’s

you must wait then ante up and play once again

while you stay at the table with your brothers

When you’ve been trumped you must play a long game

For time’s on your side as all things decline

Before he can fail, he must first succeed

Posturing dominance vulpine lupine

Cast in crypto-gold to look like Caesar

Acting as if there’s no law can bind him

He’s going to say something outrageous each day

Sometimes led on by his keepers sometimes at whim

When you’ve been trumped watch out for madmen

Crazed with power and enabling a king

Trading votes in order to pay homage at court

Unable to see their king’s gone ding-a-ling

When you’ve been trumped it’s just a defeat

Victory comes when voters cast ballots

Having seen the mad king and his court at work

Next year the country will cast out some bigots

When you’ve been trumped you must play a long game

For time’s on your side as all things decline

Before he can fail, he must first succeed

Posturing dominance vulpine lupine

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                   2025

Dunkirk 

June 1st, 1940

A Work in Progress 26

At dawn the last men of the rearguard got to the beach

There were no boats waiting to take them off

So, they trudged miles towards Dunkirk

While Messerschmidt’s strafed in daylight

finding a rowboat, they dragged to the shore 

floated out to sea

where a sloop picked them up 

Donal's father said he came back on a sailboat

  

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                        2025

The party “included personnel from the 1st Battalion, The South Lancashire Regiment, the 6th Battalion The Black Watch and Brigade Headquarters personnel, as well as Fusiliers.  The party marched to Dunkirk, where a rowing boat was found and towed into the water.  Eventually the party was picked up by a sloop which, although twice hit by bombs, eventually reached Dover”.

A Short History of the 2nd Battalion Royal Fusiliers City of London Regiment during the first year of the war.  Published by The Naval & Military Press.