For Odd Helgason 

A Work in Progress
116

First footsteps on the flagstones then pumping of the drones

It’s Catcherside the piper plays up high there in the stones

Watching the music waving its way lit by the moon and stars 

Remembering those long passed away, among them why, why her

The pipes put down he scans the sky so full of constellations

Orion   Aurvandil    Orvandil

An Icelandic farmer was one who knew their names

Odd Helgason who mapped the stars

A relative of those who looted Holy Island

Who sailed to Iceland discovered Greenland

Newfoundland Baffin Bay Ellesmere Island

Hunting for walrus tusks or just going Viking

Brave astronauts go towards the moon NASA at its best

Will they return to a world at war that America has distressed?

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                       2026

Questions on a Cloudy Night

A Work in Progress
115

We’re so woke we elected a mentally ill man

We’re so woke we accept incipient dementia

We’re so woke we allow this to continue

We know he’ll get worse so do his enablers

Trump trusts Putin more than our allies

Is he so far gone we’re in a war we won’t win?

Will armed men from ICE take over our airports

Intercepting arriving passengers at exit?

Demanding ID that was checked at arrival

Wherever passengers boarded a plane

We're so woke will we become habituated

to armed men standing in public places?

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                         2026

Distraction Rules the Day

A Work in Progress
114

Time overlays composting like unrolling sod

Burying the past time present has trod

Memories resurrect history lives on

Without death there is no resurrection

Trump has famed his gilded name monumental

Memorialized on facades all over our capitol

We’re gripped by conspiracy QAnon has won

Pam Bondi covers up pedophiles was Trump one?

Thank God for Ukraine despite all of Trump’s taunts

His agenda appears to be whatever Putin wants

Mullahs complacently thinking they had won

Meeting above ground where bombs got their job done

Another day of infamy another day of shame

Schoolgirls dead because old data was pre-gamed

We are led to believe or do we just follow 

Trusted sources where truth never rings hollow

Distraction rules the day holding all at bay

Border Collie Billy checks to see if all’s OK

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                       2026