days of long shadows
trees standing guard in deep snow
light waits for solstice
Category Archives: poem
Tipping Point
Not the moment
you came down the stairs
that first night and
I recognized the future
Not the sight of you
after a year apart
walking out of the airport fog
with love on your lips
Not the joy of raising children
our hands clasped hard
to speak love in silence
our shield against their fledging
Not the words
that turned time finite
and wanting to leave I stayed
knowing you would have
The love that whispered
its long goodbye, until
I found you one cold morning
and knew your heart
had left without me
It was this
________________________________
For Mike
Thinning time
Seven mornings in a row
the early eastern light
has snatched me away from sleep
filling my eyes with huge slashes
of sunrise, dark angry and pink
The first was on samhain, and
I could see the hand of Rage
reaching slyly toward the thinning
scrim of time’s divide
its camp follower Fire hoping
to slip through alongside
compressed to nothing
like the soft bones of mice
The whispers of my genes begged
shout No and cry many tears
They will thicken the dawn
refusing entry to this surfeit of evil
All you love depends on them
Audio: Read by the author.
Haiku for a Tuesday morning
Always last to leave
she perches drinking her fill
many miles to fly
Floaters
High summer
in an old house
occupied by an army
of visiting bugs
brings dreams
of parachutes
for those I must evict
The one too many ones
the wrong kind of spider
a waving scuttler
scooped up
all elbowed legs
and angled hairy parts
Then I run
the mercy packet
to the door
flung open to release
the tissue wrapped
passenger
and watch it float
down to sanctuary
on a bed
of violet leaves
________________________________________
A very old house. In the winter we have critters. Summer brings the bugs The right kind of spiders? Thin bodied long-legged spiders that look like Charlotte.
Haiku for Monday morning
the green wall is back
trees working hard through the night
birds seek their shelter
The right note
Tomorrow it might have been fifty-two
not just thirteen years since our thirty-ninth
Aligned with family and gratitude
the day always reflected joy,
the heat of our love folded into stuffing
The missing of him has gotten harder
but it seems he knows. I came upon
the sound of his small gasp
that wrapped me up each time
in beauty gauze, when finally ready
I presented myself to his gaze
before our evenings out.
Deliciousness itself, just knowing
that he would when I did, and
that he always meant it.
And I can smile now, the memory
a pitch perfect gift.
.
.
Audio: Read by the author.
Until then
There may still be
wind, that has not kissed
my face
Or light on vernal
water, not seen through
my lens
Or singing, that has
yet to hum along
my bones
Or time with friends, dancing
in green waves, sand on
my feet
Or words to share, flowing
from the mouth of
my heart
But, there was always love, with
you, so if I skip the rest
to waltz out in your arms,
It will be enough to
know these gifts waited
with me, just in case.
Audio: Read by the author.
_____________________________________________
A birthday poem for Mike
Sans Bliss
We were long split atoms
even then the possibility of us
had ricocheted into echoes
competing thoughts composted
into a white sound mask.
Inexperienced, I flung my satin stole
of certainty over each shoulder
and stormed away, convinced
I was right, but too young
and wrong headed, ignorant of
the deeper dance of lust and love
that finally shook its head
and left to visit other lives
Leaving behind memories of touch
by tantalizing milkweed silk
of hearing a fluted thrush note
fading every time I would have
ventured back
____________________________
for S
How to mend a fence
It all depends, the farmer said,
on how high the fence and wide the gap
How tall is just enough to push thoughts out
or hold emotions in, and had I thought of life
enriched by feelings? Is the gap a full on
crop of breaks, or something less
some oddly chronic stuttered disconnect
Fluorescence hindered by its oozing ballast
Can we glue chain split apart, or pickets
freed by loose, bent nails?
It all depends, the farmer said, on how we view
the things that we might do for love.
______________________________
Day 20. The prompt from NaPoWriMo Day 19. To write a didactic poem, instructional. No restraints.
The lover
Brown eyes that relegated those of graceland’s long-gone king
to minor status, a dedicated would-be ladies man
busking for apples and caresses on his velvet nose,
infinitely curious, sidling up to eager hands to give as well as take
His middle life was night to bright days at Bedlam, his courage fable worthy
walking a path of pain and fear right to the brink, rallying when all hope
seemed gone, taking a chance at life found only in his dreams
Great will and vital spirit, embers fanned by voices of his sudden liberation
he chose life, a miracle of parts, his resurrection measured by small steps
great victories for him and for the people working to reclaim his life in full
Despite his none too patient jennys and indifferent sheep
once healed he stood his ground, they were his charges
as was any child that came within his reach, a solid presence for small bodies
lovingly benign, an echo of his youth
His friendship won was golden, taking morning kisses, braying out his siren call
sometimes fierce, he never claimed perfection nor did we ask it
he led us gently to communion with his world, departing when he knew
his work was done
The pasture slope near his beloved tree is where he rests, and we will visit
bringing love
__________________________________
For Simon, who died yesterday, January 3, 2015. and for Jon and Maria who shared him with us.
Still
What visits me today
A lullaby in baritone
and funny bits of song
Dreadful jokes
in nuanced tones
Bearded bristle paired
with a million kisses
All too human shoulders
I thought and hoped
were everlasting granite
Long held friendships both
a gift and an example
The pungent scent of cuban leaf
lit anywhere but in the house
A feel for speed and open road
the skies he loved and flew so well
Laughter books and music
with the color light and form
he looked at every day
These brought him peace
the certainty of love
from open eyes
Straight told advice
his caring deep
His spirit so ingrained
that now whenever
need is great
I conjure loving echoes
of an imperfect
perfect father
to see me through
the dark
_______________________________
My father died at 89 in 2005, suddenly, but blessedly not alone, my sister was with him. His legend looms large in our lives, to quote a beatle, and I know we all miss him, need him, still and always.
Life With Horace 