Death waits patiently
leans in close,
hand on sweat glistened brow.
Nostrils flare in and out
release short puffs of damp air
while lips part to blow soft spittle foam.
As pupils grow darker still
she lifts her head mightily
then settles into pungent straw
muscles still, reined no more.
Gateways to the heart
change through the seasons.
Youthful romanticism,
tempted by pastels
sweet scented carnations
valentines in pink envelopes
a rosebud mouth.
Passionate eroticism,
eyes seek carnal depths
lips’ open invitation
rose petal paths
and pulsing tempos.
Love divine, a decoupage,
years layered on years
passion and comfort
within familiar folds,
your skin next to mine.
Photo from a walk in St George, Bermuda.
Our family bible was leather bound with gilt edges, like a large coffee-table book, except it sat on an out-of-the-way end table. Mother listened raptly to the door-to-door salesman and agreed. Books you own are a sign of pedigree. And then she filed away the precious threads of her life between its pages.
I used to sit fingering the bits and pieces of family history. Poems on scraps of paper with her handwriting: 1944 ~ Bud this is how much I love you. There was yellowed newsprint: Arthur Petitclair, dead at 58 with the smiling face of my grandfather staring out at me. A fragile, stained news clipping introduced Butch, the cousin I never met. …tragically found dead in his bed on Tuesday morning, at age eight, by his mother, Helvie Petitclair. There were holy cards of Mary and Saint Francis, and handmade cards drawn in those primary color thick crayons we had in grade school.
My parents called. We sold the house and everything in it to a nice young family. Everything? Everything. We just want to move on.
A nice young family? I suppose they held the bible upside down and shook out all those scraps of history. They probably sit and read the real text inside the leather cover.
The lilac family lived on a lane
colorful and ostentatious
in a quiet sort of way.
Muted violet, creamy whites
pastel pinks and deep purples
beautiful dressers and lovers of perfume.
Nestled in a blanket of green
she peeks out with her ruffles.
A bitsy thing among her friends
demure and delicate
the sweet-scented
Miss Lily of the Valley.
She quietly lives the rules of mourning
body drooped in shadows
occasionally sees the sun
empathy personified
destined for sadness
the perennial bleeding heart.
Into each life, a little humor must fall.
Frozen peas on the list
she was pleasantly surprised
to get a two-fer
when a hot flash hit,
leaning into frozen foods
for her favorite brand.
We came upon this lovely elderly woman one Sunday morning in Bermuda. A portrait poem. Can you picture her?
Sunday’s Pauline
She stood at the sloped curb’s edge
pleated red dress and feathered church hat
peering up and down the street
craning her neck looking for, what?
Her walker, with pocket book dangling
faced the street, precariously .
Eyes glued on her wheels
we Good Afternooned in the Bermudian way.
Broad shoulders and broader still smile
white gloved hand extended
Good Afternoon. My name’s Pauline
and I sure could use some help.
My hands clutched the walker’s edge
wheels slowly rattled toward the street
walking backwards, eyes locked with Pauline’s
her black oxfords shuffled along.
The Chevy sputtered and gagged
maneuvered to the curb,
aluminum grey, silver shine long gone
primer splotches added to the vintage feel.
Safely inside, walker stowed
window cranked down low
head out with peppered hair flowing
she caught our eye again.
God sure does give you a neighbor
especially when He knows you need one!
What dreams lie within your mind’s eye
lying beside me this autumn’s eve?
Your chest almost imperceptibly rises
and flutter falls, like the owl’s eyes
staring strong and wise
flicker at a moth passing by the moon.
Soft sibilant sounds escape barely open lips
too soon years before, taped tight
received life-sustaining intubated air
machines whirred fear, invaded dreamless sleep.
My lids droop heavy, sleep demanding time
your dreams rest safe, secret till the morrow.
Our morning rite awaits, repeats these many years
Put down the paper dear, and tell me last nights’ tales.
Veil of sleep lifted by sun’s insistent rays
like my bridal veil, pushed back by eager fingers
you sought a promise kiss before God’s altar.
Not deep like later.
Kisses given one thousand times one thousand
over a world of tomorrows. Today we sit content
in time-withered bodies
wizened you beside my wisened self.
Amazed always, that you chose me
my soul complete, enveloped still.
In response to the Daily Post’s Weekly Photo Challenge: what does “envelops” mean to you? Photo taken at dawn in Provincetown, Massachusetts.
There’s a place outside my universe
just across the street
viewed from my living room window
one elevator and a three minute walk away.
Purgatorial stop for innocent souls
once scourged by searing flames
they claw, stretch, adapt to live
ignore death’s too soon call.
Red yellow flames once licked their skin
lit pain in fissures blackened deep
now loved ones stand and pray
plead for angels’ breath to soothe.
Their passage, mythological in scope
an underworld of white-masked faces
wrap and unwrap shrouds of gauze
each treatment claims a toll.
I sit and stare from comfortable skin
commuter rail late, supper cold
he-said-she-said politics at work.
Tears erupt as eyes seek light.
Suddenly see through the panes
eyes pop open, slapped to senses
you have life, move on and live
as they struggle up from hell.
This poem resulted from a prompt in my poetry class, to write about something you see all the time, IE perhaps look out your window, or note what you see on your daily walk to work, something in your house….look more carefully at something you see every day. Photo is actual view from our window — motivation for the poem.
Watch closely. The mundane
becomes sublime, if we care to see.
Fields of timothy grass ruffled by wind
black steed glistens galloping through fields
sinewy athlete leaps to float over highest titanium bar
sunflowers smile, heads turn to bask in their namesake’s rays
Swan Lake dancers glide and spin across soft lit stage
gulls with wings spread wide, soar above the sea.
I look up from crowded city streets
to see this artisan’s creation
shift colors in the wind
urban ethereal
beauty.
Janet Echelman’s aerial sculpture, As If It Were Already There, soars above Boston’s Rose Kennedy Greenway. It’s made by hand-splicing rope and knotting twine into an interconnected mesh of more than a half-million nodes. Whenever any one of its elements moves, every other element is affected. Its fibers are 15 times stronger than steel but appear lace like. Do watch the short videos. They’re breathtaking! We were mesmerized. We’ll go back to see it at night, when it is lit with thousands of LED lights knotted into its threads.
Follow the Clouds
Stairs direct eyes, climb to clouds
holy canopy to this house of God
inside wooden warmth minus marble cold
simplicity defines Divine.
Four elderly black women
dressed in crimson choir garb
raise voices in praise
sing hymns as ancestors sleep
I sit ramrod straight, cedar bench stiff
then kneel on threadbare cushions
and for the first time in many years
my spirit soars.
My Photos: Her Majesties Chappel, St Peter’s Church, is the oldest surviving Anglican church in continuous use outside the British Isles, and the oldest Protestant Church in continuous use in the New World. Located in St. George, Bermuda, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the interior is filled with pew boxes and ceiling rafters of cedar wood that was long ago, plentiful on the island — and then depleted by ship building and disease. The land to the west of the church was reserved for burying slaves prior to the British Empire’s emancipation of slaves in 1834. We were privileged to worship here every Sunday in February, 2015. Also using this for a photo challenge on CLOUDS
lillian the home poet 