Posts for June 12, 2019 (page 3)

If I had planted flower seeds
They’d be long since gone
They’d’ve floated to a river
and drifted till the dawn

They’d’ve met the Mississippi
Trying to find a place to go
Maybe someplace further on
They’d have a place to grow

They’d get kinda water-logged
And fish would eat a few
The rest would stick together
With the help of friendship glue

On to the Gulf of Mexico
That’s a long, long trip
There they would seperate 
Some got aboard a ship

Several stopped in Cuba
They went here and there
A couple went to Cancun, an
Corpus Christi got a pair

Those who were not eaten
and those who floated on
Got themselves to fertile soil
and bloomed in early dawn

There was a rainbow in the sky today
a pleasant surprise 
(as some might say)
that broke up all the grey

It didn’t last long
a minute- no more
but it caught my eye
and held it 

The simple thought of you
caused me to look away
wishing for your presence

And when I looked to the sky
to see it once more
like you
the rainbow
was gone

Open the door. Group chat with the girls.
Fix the leak coming from the busted wall.

Sound of music: flex spending money
from insurance and two week cash advance.

Lunch break. The rainclouds doming
over the weekend. Check email. 

Phone’s broke. The password, forgotten.
Wait for the evening, net-muggy. Plan.

this is what i imagine–
delirious, we’ll drink up the disco lights
dance entangled with smoke and mirrors
dirt and disenchantment, forgetting
familiar lips, the words of a song
solidifying in our soles, a togetherness
tethered to a single night

Watching Windows
Magnolia, the dark
Consistent perfumes that bled
When I first saw you

the color of a fox in winter, the darkened woods outside your door alive with owls and ravens, you make the townsfolk nervous when you come to market, talking to the cat perched on your shoulder as you shop for herbs and roots they think will turn their sons to frogs or their husbands to rodents, leaving me to be your one enchanted love. Their caution is my gain.

You have sucker punched me in the gut
and choked me with my own tears.
You have straddled my chest in the middle of the night
to squeeze the breath from my lungs.
You have dragged me to dark places,
to the dirt-rimmed lip of the grave,
forced my head down
and filled my eyes with
nothingness.

And still, you aren’t done.

Like Grendel’s mother,
you are raging toward me now. 
No one can stand watch with me.
Time is no ally.
I am defenseless
waiting for your wrath to return.

First there was Tiger Tom,
brought home by dad,
suckered in by eating fish scraps
off the boat.
Sophie his mate
(the neighbor Pat’s cat)
gifted us numerous liters
inside the barn.
Tiny and Tigger,
Cutie Pie & Uggie (Ugly)
spawn of spawn,
endless lineage.
College cats
one with no name,
jumped from a car window
on a journey back home.
He was okay,
taken in by Christians 
coming out of church.
Then my dear Pixie,
who chose my lap 
at the shelter,
destined for home.
Phobe was my man’s.
She lasted 20 years 
to be flattened 1 day.
The grey one was Monkey,
Mr. Man, or Monk, who
ran sideways, tail curled.
Nya de Kitty, rescued from hell
pees in odd places,
yowls if disturbed.
Finally Mordecai, 
so civilized
he drinks from a glass,
yet mischievous, demoted, 
out on his furry ass.

I have stood in the sun
on a hot summer day
and thirsted for 
a drink of water,
though I never
stopped to wonder
what the water
thirsts for,
certainly not
a drink of me.

Compulsively I make trays of ice,
keep piling the clouded cubes
into a freezer bin until there are hundreds.
To me they are welcoming & approachable,
suggest a blizzard of plenty like when late
cherry blossoms scatter & carpet
the city park. Every time I open
the freezer I’m ice-rich. It’s a certain
kind of greed. My husband asks why
I’m hoarding ice & I can’t answer. Clearly
I am indulgent & it’s only getting worse.

I’m up again tonight to covet the chilly
squares. I stir them with my cold, blue hands.