Relationships

Spring Chill

lillian3 Comments

She wandered outside this early morn
stunned to be alone
last night’s storm, still wet upon the lawn.
She walked the garden
unaware that wisps of cloud
accompanied her overhead.

Reaching out,
she cupped the tulip crown
within her saddened hand
and watched, as petals dislodged,
weighed down with rain,
fell slowly to the ground.

Feet damp and cold,
she sat in one of two chairs
on the cement slab they called a patio.
Eyes pressed shut, face tilted to the sky
she felt the sun, breathed in the lilac scent
and finally understood.

Junie Z.

lillian12 Comments

West School, still here.
That metal bar around the schoolyard,
smoother now. So many years
of little hands sliding along its surface.
I bend low, touch its coolness
and you’re with me again.
Junie with the short dark hair.
Eyes closed, I see four anklet socks
in plain brown mary janes
kick up and over the rail,
cotton dresses in laughing faces.
Up the street, a car alarm blares.
And just like that,
your laughter floats away,
my hand lifted from the bar.


WRITING PROMPT in my June Challenge class:  recall a memory of someone, what provoked the memory — a scent, a place? 

Crayon World

lillian14 Comments

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Color me rainbow happy
your Red Sox cap next to my blue visor.
We sat in bright colored Adirondack chairs
kite string loose, then tight,
as you played with the tension.
Our dreams sailed high into cloudless sky
paled only by your art deco shades
as you stared out, looking for words.
Color me livid when you talked about her,
like lightning flashes in a raging sky.
Anger fueled by heat, dissipated over days of grey.
Rainbow chairs sit empty, lined up, waiting.
Color me invisible, when the door closed.

Photo:
from Provincetown, on Massachusetts’  Cape Cod. Poem and photo in response to the Daily Post Photo Challenge to interpret ROY G. BIV — the memonic to remember colors of the rainbow.

With Apologies to Oscar Wilde

lillian3 Comments

I’d never met a ghost
or a celebrity
so was surprised on the treadmill
when Oscar Wilde whispered
directly in my ear,
the heart was meant to be broken.

Home again,
caretaker roles reversed
your heart beats strong
mine now slow,
blown out from stress
like a Japanese octopus bag.

Takotsubo,
Broken Heart Syndrome.
Not the stuff of playwrights.

I learned again that day
the importance of being earnest.
Talking softly with, not at,
we climbed five stairs
inch by inch,
this time
your steps
matched to mine.

Low Tide Morning

lillian6 Comments

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So many seaside two-weeks
in this place with you.
This time, different.

crack….crack……crack.
Roused awake, I leave our bed
step outside to the dawn’s cool.

Jetty exposed at low tide
long and hard, a battering table
for the single industrious gull.

It hovers, takes aim, releases
crack……scallop shell hits
unyielding rock. Stays firm.

The gull swoops down,
picks up shell, rises, hovers
and lets go, again and again.

CRACK….success.
Morsel quickly consumed,
wings flare to catch the draft and soar.

I follow its path until chill seeps in
bare feet suddenly cold
high tide’s tangled seaweed nearby.

Back with you, under rumpled sheets
my hand hovers, drops down
rests upon your chest, like yesterday.

And yesterday’s yesterday.
Every day, since that day
I feel your every breath.

Inhale, exhale.
Yes, you are here
with me.

Sounds of Night

lillian13 Comments

The Victorian house groans awake
as a full harvest moon winks
through faded window shutters,
thrown wide open.

Smiling dead faces
in wallpapered hallways,
listen from chipped gilt frames
roll their eyes in sepia wonder.

Walls thick with memories
absorb the sounds,
sweet words whispered
mount to passionate moans.

Floorboards squeal
as casters roll in well worn grooves,
planks of wood etched
with scars of love.

This bed of generations,
alive again tonight.