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Archive for May, 2013

Five on Seeing

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on May 11, 2013| 4 Comments »

Did you notice,
I say, the gorilla’s nose
is shaped like a heart?
Yes, she says, but my heart
is shaped like a fist.

*

Easy to see
I’m a wave in the water—
when I disappear
nothing essential
will be lost.

*

Harder to believe
nothing’s lost when my daughter
pulls the needle
out of my knitting
and the stitches fall off.

*

Ever notice
how hard it is to see eye
to eye when our
backs are toward
each other?

*

Solar eclipse
in Taurus and the window
between worlds opens—
eyes wide, advises my chart,
it’s a new day for your heart

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Entering the Story

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on May 10, 2013| 3 Comments »

I find you
crouched in the cold
lighting matches
one after another.
It is a long, long night
and it is not near over.
There is nowhere
you want to return.
You strike another.
And again.
We cup our palms
around your light.
What do you see in it?
I want to offer you
bread, a blanket, a room,
my hands, a different ending,
a kinder plot.
You want only
another match.

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Seymour Avenue

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on May 9, 2013| 2 Comments »

All day I imagine
how it could be me,
could be you, it is her
on that street, in that car,
in the chains, in the window.
All day I break down
the door. All day
I turn toward love.
It is not hard to find love,
but it is not easy
to be joyful in it.
We are so alone
together.
All day I break.
The door
is still not open
enough.

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A Little Shadow Tag

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on May 9, 2013| 1 Comment »

A Little Shadow Tag

How to make peace with your shadow side? Perhaps a game of shadow tag. Two years ago,  I wrote this poem, published today in Journey of the Heart, an exploration of shadow and light. This blog of Women’s Spiritual Poetry continues to make my heart sing–so many fine poems and wonderful poets on the site to explore. 

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Two Simple-ings

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on May 8, 2013| 2 Comments »

still blooming
that apricot tree in my
rearview mirror

*

playing Schumann
for forty minutes
it’s the only news

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Now We’re Talking

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on May 7, 2013| 4 Comments »

I want to hear that you have forgiven me.
I want to hear that you see how we sail
on the water of our mistakes.
I do not know how to sail, love,
and I get sick at sea,
but here we are
like two drunks
in a tiny boat
with no map
and big waves
and darling,
we might just
go back in that sea,
I’m not saying we won’t,
but for this moment,
it all seems so funny,
so funny, we have no life vests,
no oars, and the sail has holes,
We’re surrounded by water
we cannot drink, and I don’t
see any land, but here we
are, darling, here we are,
with just the right weather
for me to forget that there’s anything
I think I need to hear.

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Though the King Might Not Agree

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on May 7, 2013| 3 Comments »

All this must be spun tonight. —The Brothers Grimm

She does not care
that the gems
are not real.
She wears
the necklace
and feels beautiful.
She does not care
that the shoes
are not true glass slippers.
In the low angled sun
she slips across
the scuffed maple floors
and dances in clear plastic shoes
bought on sale at Target
to music that only she can hear.
She hums and twirls
in the dimming light.
She is not like
the miller’s daughter.
She knows how,
all by herself,
to spin what is useless
and cheap
into gold.

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How We Try to Shape Things

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on May 5, 2013| 2 Comments »

There are no arms
on the woman in the picture,

the one my daughter
drew and handed to me,

saying, “Mommy, this is you.”
She was so proud, her eyes

so alive, and the green crayon lines
show a woman with long hair,

long legs and a big lopsided smile.
And no arms.

It is not that I mind being elbowless,
but my friend Jack once told me

that children who draw people with no arms
are disempowered, and there

are studies to prove it, he said,
how their lack of agency

lasts into adulthood.
I want to show her, “Here,

darling, here is where the arms go.”
But instead I say, “The green lines

look strong. And her smile
makes me smile.” I kiss her,

and tell her thank you,
and she squeezes me, her two small

arms so strong, I notice, even when
they let me go.

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Wild Rose Goes on a Date

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on May 4, 2013| 2 Comments »

Wild Rose walks into a bar.
She is wearing a very small
black dress that shows off
the bulge of her belly,
the rippled skin of her thighs,
and the desert flatness of her chest.
She catches the eyes of no one.
There is no one here she wants
to meet except the very happy man
in the corner who is buying
drinks for everyone.
“You’re a bit late,”
Death says to her as she sits
across from him.
“I know,” she says. “I wasn’t sure
what to tell the family, so I said
I’d be at a PTA meeting.”
“Dressed like that?” he says,
and he gives her a wink.
“You look ready for anything.”
He hands Wild Rose a drink.
Tequila. She licks the salt
from his hand.
“Let’s dance,” he says.
“On the tables,” she says.
And the band never
takes a break.

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Amen

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on May 3, 2013| 4 Comments »

Today God is perhaps like a rash
that terribly blooms
on your leg. Red blisters
on a raised red patch.
For nearly two weeks,
it is all you can think about.
What to eat for dinner and
it itches. The children need
milk and it itches. The sky!
it’s so pink at dawn and
it itches. It is your best friend’s
birthday and it itches. Israel
conducts an airstrike into Syria
and it itches. This is how
I have wanted God to show up—
hand in hand with everything.
I have wanted to not forget,
to not be distracted by the events
of the world, to find God
in the every fold of the day.
God in the tea cup. God in
the stop sign. God in the empty
dish. God in the brush.
This is not what I had in mind,
this pain, this incessant urge
to shred my own skin, to scratch
what cannot be touched.
But it’s working. All eclipsed.
God in everything.
In the incessant tug of it,
the red, deep pain of it,
the calling to bow to it
now and now and now.

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