Posted in Uncategorized, tagged dusting, parenting, poem, poetry, snow on January 11, 2014| 1 Comment »
There is dust
all over the world,
sings the little girl.
She is brushing snow
away from the ice
at the edge
of the mostly frozen river.
Her song goes on:
And somewhere else
there is someone else
who is dusting.
And she sings and sings
and sweeps away
the white dusting
until beneath her
purple gloves
the frozen world
shines.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged curiosity, door, key, opening, poem, poetry on January 10, 2014| 4 Comments »
walk into the wall
walk into the wall, walk in
to the wall, walk into
the wall, walk into the oh,
there’s a door
*
key after key
after three-hundred-sixty-
six keys that do not
fit the keyhole I find
the door’s unlocked
*
stepping through the door
to find
another door
*
who built
all these doorways
anyway?
*
something about
a doorway—it seems to want
to be walked through
*
or is it the walker
who does the wanting,
already I feel
it rising me
curiosity
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged allowing, anticipation, being present, poem, poetry, waiting on January 9, 2014| 1 Comment »
The snow begins
then stops to fall.
In the alley, brown
tracks run against the white.
The gray folds through the air
and unfolds. Nothing
about this day seems
capable of settling in.
It is a like a woman
thinking about what
she wants. The blossoms
of her thoughts open
like roses in fast forward.
They wilt and dry in similar
fashion. They are out of season.
This does not stop them.
Sometimes we like to think
we are waiting. Waiting
for something marvelous to happen,
or waiting for an ache to disappear,
or waiting for gray to be
something other than gray.
And sometimes we see what
a gift it is, this indecisive day,
this watching imaginary blooms
that seem so real you can almost
smell the red perfume, almost.
Outside the window,
it is snowing again. No,
not snowing. But the gray
it has settled in and now
the dirty tracks look
like empty staves and anyone
listening might hear through the glass
how the birds don’t wait
to fill in the space with song.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged attractors, loss, math, poem, poetry, purpose on January 8, 2014| 2 Comments »
Look out the kitchen window
into the night, and all you see through the pane
is a vague version of yourself,
not quite transparent,
but substanceless.
Perhaps car lights pass
through the shape of your head.
And then it is just your reflection
imprinted on darkness again.
*
I wanted to write you a letter
about the dream I had last night.
We were talking on the phone.
This is how I knew it was a dream.
*
A chained male dog
will strain his leash
when he can smell
a bitch in heat.
*
Try to listen beyond the window.
Beyond the refrigerator hum.
Beyond the sound
of your own breathing in, breathing out.
*
There was a necklace in the dream,
a strand of green diamonds,
one I lost long ago.
There it was in my hands again,
and I thought to myself,
as I balanced it in an armful of things,
you are going to lose it again.
*
What do you hear?
*
One can measure it,
the dog’s desire,
by the force of his tug,
the direction of his pull.
In modern mathematics,
in the language of dynamics,
we call this an attractor,
a purpose or motive that connects us
with our virtual future.
*
The point: it is not
the past that drives us.
Not even the greatest loss.
We are pulled toward that
which has not yet happened.
The future yearns for us.
*
The phone rings,
the plot thickens.
The woman in the window
reaches toward the receiver.
The voice on the other end
is not yours.
*
You have prepared
your whole life for this moment,
the one you let go
right now.
*
Machines do not have internal purpose.
The typewriter writes what the poet types.
The car goes where the driver goes.
The refrigerator chills what is put inside.
But everything that is alive
is pulled toward certain attractors
that help with growth, survival,
continuation of the species.
The honey bee moves to the flower.
The mud wasp digs a funneled nest.
The black widow spiders will eat
the other offspring in the sac.
So who could explain why,
though a letter will never arrive at your door,
I watch as the woman in the window
takes out her pen, consider how much
she must long to write you a letter,
watch her as she stares
at her empty page.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged childhood memory, food, love, mother, poetry, spam on January 8, 2014| 1 Comment »
I ate my string beans cooked too long
in cream of mushroom soup
and I ate soggy tater tots
and neon green fruit loops.
I ate cranberry relish
served in the shape of a can,
but please, mama, pretty please, I’d say
don’t make me eat the Spam.
I’d eat dip made from cheese food
on chips from Frito Lay,
I’d eat red Jello salad
with layers of mayonnaise,
I’d eat the bits of Jiffy Pop
burned on the disposable pan,
but please, mama, pretty please, I’d say
don’t make me eat the Spam.
One day when I had left the home
I teased my mom about
the way she served us processed food
when we were growing up,
like cans of Spam and beans and peas
from dusty shelves at the store,
Oh honey, she said, I wanted fresh food.
It was all we could afford.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged memory, pain, poem, poetry on January 6, 2014| 1 Comment »
The earth itself is a magnet.
Surely I knew this once,
but reading it today,
it was as if I had never known this before.
How many things have I forgotten?
And learned again only to forget again?
So many stains of emptiness.
Is it wrong to not think this is a bad thing?
This morning I woke with a now familiar pain.
Someday perhaps I will forget
these months of ache, the throb
that makes itself known whenever I am still.
Will I also forget the surprise today, was it thrill,
when I recognized each throb in my leg
as the beating of my heart.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged life, poem, poetry on January 5, 2014| 4 Comments »
I fill this bucket
and empty this bucket
and fill this bucket
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged avalanche, death, loss, poem, poetry on January 4, 2014| 2 Comments »
the map is shrinking
still, all tremble, we plot
the points that remain
*
in the rush,
in the roar, in the rumble
the silence after
*
I hate white
this is no confession
I hate it
*
the body, crushed,
lungs, crushed, shape of a man
dug up
*
not my nephew,
not my blood, still
these tears
*
howl turns to yelp
turns to gurgle turns
to snow catching sun
*
where in my body
is there white? how
might I forgive it
*
out from under,
this struggle, we take turns,
sometimes it’s personal
*
sometimes the white says
don’t come near me, sometimes it sings
your name
*
I did not read
the obituary, only your letter
black scratch on white
*
blank page, blank page,
white cloud, white skull, white slope
another blank page
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged friendship, love, luck, memory, poem, poetry on January 4, 2014| 1 Comment »
There between the tortillas
and the frozen okra,
an old friend.
How is it possible
to love someone so much
but to forget that we love them
until quite by accident
we see them again?
Lucky for me,
I needed to buy tortillas,
and there they were, on sale,
our favorite brand.
There are many kinds of luck,
each like a rope
that rings a different bell.
Falling in love again
with an old dear friend,
even if the reunion lasts
only until the end of aisle two,
I feel in these three minutes like a little girl
pulling the rope of the cathedral
bells, and letting myself
be swung by the full body chime
as it dongs, dongs, dongs.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged letting go, poem, poetry on January 2, 2014| 2 Comments »
old moon notes
to myself, unable to read
my own writing
*
crossing the river
in a wide shallow place
these thoughts of you
*
this silk gown of shoulds
what a nice garment to
let slip to the floor
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged envy, poems, poetry, self acceptance on January 1, 2014| 1 Comment »
Dear Mrs. Jones,
Please accept my resignation.
I know you have come
to expect me beside you.
What a long time we have
been at this together.
Husbands and houses
and graduate degrees,
children and book deals
and dress sizes.
It would be easy to blame
my torn hamstring.
It’s just gotten so hard
to keep up. Painful, even.
But that isn’t it.
Sometimes I notice
that I forget you, your
perfect complexion, your
six-figure advances, your
obedient children, your yacht,
and life is a whole lot more lovely then.
Mrs. Jones, I get seasick.
I do not want the yacht.
Sincerely,