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.
Sometimes, things happen in life that truly truly make you thankful for every day. I’ve been 46 + years now with the love of my life — and we are grateful for every day in this “rejuvenatement” period of our lives (see my About for an explanation of the term). This poem was motivated by a poetry class assignment: look very very closely at things around you and write about something you want to save from oblivion. The mind jumps around and makes various connections, the pen writes, scratches out, and writes again…and this is the result.
Forever
Two gulls skitter about the shore’s edge
leaving track upon track, their dance notation.
Voices sound cacophonous shrills
wings flap, contract, and flap again.
Two children skip, swinging hand in hand
suddenly unjoin. Side by side, in unison
arms wide, they leap and jump
like gulls ahead who splash, lift and soar.
Waves rollick and return, out and always in.
Sea, animals, and children seen in twos
assault my oneness, so recently assumed
etched into being, sears and spills my tears.
Hands rest upon this familiar rail
seek coolness from the seasons’ heat
instead, send chills from hand to heart
my body, an eclipse of the sun.
Let go the rail. Come stand with me, my love
your life, not death, forever.
NaPoWriMo April 25. Without Prompt.
Loss
Eyes droop heavy
tear salt encrusted lashes
stare forward unseeing.
Throat gags trying to escape
the cloying flower scent
preserved in artificial cold air.
Silent screams inaudible
smothered in the cacophony
of shushing hushing voices.
Hands folded, cold
should be warm in mine
swinging down our lane.
Comprehension dawns
sun shines out of synch
with the ending of our days.
I didn’t know
it would make memories rollout
like that twirling lottery cage
that stops and releases balls as you
hold your breath and hope for magic.
She died
and left me to create the magic
sorting through a junk drawer
stuffed and crammed
with years of tuckaways.
NaPoWriMo Day 17 without a prompt. A constant in everyone’s life is the ability to dream. In your sleep and in your waking time. But what do we do when that dream is unfulfilled – stopped dead in its tracks? Sometimes by a conscious choice, sometimes by circumstances that present themselves, wanted or not.
The Framed Dream
It was a short notice: Helen is predeceased by Bud
and Charles Gruenwald Jr, her husband and son.
God knows, she’d lived the last eight years
impatiently waiting to join them.
It moved with her when she was left alone.
An eight by ten picture from a 1930s
Life Magazine: young nurse in white cap
surrounded by glowing light.
Her nurses training lasted six months.
Instead of earning a nurse’s pin
she eloped and eight months later
put my brother to her breast.
The room was empty when I took it down.
Water-stained backing, script barely readable
My dearest Helen, No one can take this away
from you. Sister Everista 1937 For sixty years,
she’d kept her dream in a plastic frame.
NaPoWriMo Day 14: write a poem that includes or is a dialogue and potentially expresses two points of view
———————————————————-
She sits alone, staring quietly
as tears slowly fall, untouched.
Hands in lap, formless and limp
speak emptiness into the wind.
Shoulders sag, spine slumps
the image of despair.
Her loss, once unimaginable
signals unending tomorrows without.
Uninvited, somewhere from within
the whisper comes, there are angels nearby.
The power of words – made into phrases – dependent on circumstances…
Words to a baby small
said with a grin
scooping mashed somethings
from a dripping chin.
All gone.
Long buried
dark transgression
in the almost unreachable
back room of my mind.
All gone.
Brother sudden, father slow,
mother slower still.
My lips whisper:
now – just me.
Almost – all gone
Like the fall season, she was prepared
to leave this life in a flamboyant flourish,
decked out with dew-drop tears
upon her rouged and wrinkle-veined cheeks.
lillian the home poet 