I toss words into the wind
And he exhales sound and rhythm
I have spent so much time
thinking I was the moon.
But now I wonder
if I am the sun
I rise over the horizon
draped in pink silk
and orange ribbon.
He is the night sky
so open, so limitless
I once thought I was the moon
changing, ever adapting
but now I realize
I am steady
I rise and fall, unwavering.
I am a muse
I am on fire.
My buddy in the warehouse
rolled up to me on the forklift,
stopping an appropriate distance away
with a thought in his eyes,
lowering his pandemic forced mask
to reveal something of a smile.
He said
‘Remember last year
when all we cared about
we’re those stupid safety rails they built
that we had to try and drive around,
right before they installed the impact sensors
to shut down the equipment
if we happened to hit something?
Good times.’
Good times they were, too.
I remember all the questions the sensors raised.
The one guy was so super paranoid
and thought if he stopped driving for even a minute
higher ups would get him for slacking off.
We also joked the other guy would get fired immediately.
Which he did.
Two weeks after the sensors
he blasted a chunk of concrete off the support beam,
then tried to hide it by fleeing from the scene
driving 0.5mph in emergency mode
(which shuts the vehicle down every sixty seconds)
all the way back to parking area.
I only set that alarm off once
when a faulty sensor disagreed with a woodchip
a good deal away from those new rails.
I was laughing about it,
in no way scared that anything would happen to me.
In fact, none of the changes we faced ever proved
worth the apprehension and stress we showered in
when we were just getting used to new ideas.
We discovered nothing was ever as bad as it seemed.
Or so we thought.
Crazy what a difference
a year and a super disease
can make on our lives.
Walking where summer
stole the bright green
& cured it brown.
Combat created
by insurgent memories.
We never lived there Mom.
Yes, I did play soccer in high school.
No, there isn’t a camera in the TV.
Please tell me about your first teaching job in Rochester.
Home lies a long way away.
A word challenge poem that incorporates 6 words chosen from poems posted on June 16.
Childhood memories
are pruned
to a bliss-filled hedge
of fiction
trimmed till
few knots remain
though subtly
they lay claim
to the integrity
they wrought
Everything is bad today except carrots
Who are little orange hard things made of dirt
So it is strange we eat them
Everyone should eat some dirt
I especially wish they would today
Because then not only would I have carrots,
but I would also get to see people eat dirt
Eating dirt as a formative experience
built most of my only likeable traits
goblins and nightmares will quake
at the great strength my carrots imbue me with
nobody will be able to do anything about me
and what platitudes are there for the flat-lined, coffin-inclined forebears who died before we got this far?
is it selfish to say i don’t care if we win in the end if the end winds itself into one more queer kid’s Pulse?
if we can sieve just one human being out of the drowning sea of suffering,
if we can save just one more
how can i say that’s not enough?
but how can it ever be enough?
Atop low cliff
worn into razors by the surf,
a lone song keeper touched her fingertips to delicate holes.
The slow tune echoed over stone and surf,
slowing and rushing in absent turns.
Unconcerned by cold wind
her legs tangled together and
her head leaned back against the sharp stones.
Under her knee,
a small blue crab took shelter from the sun,
nibbling clean a translucent claw.
Sea birds floated carelessly over rippling water,
and the soothesong’s tune slowed.
her fingers slid down to holes that
hummed instead of chirped.
The birds flapped, rising higher to safety
And a dark shape slid silently
over white sands.
under green tides
It swam to the knife-cliffs, sunlight
glinting
off a serpentine neck and long teeth.
It slithered into the shadowy space
that waves had carved underneith.
In that cave below the waters,
her fluttered notes echoed and reverberated,
singing choruses with themselves.
Out at sea, fishing boats drifted in toward shore,
nets pulled up tight to their hulls.
People onboard waved toward the knife-cliffs,
blowing their own horns in greeting.
Docks thudded with heavy feet,
voices shouting over waves.
The slosh of nets pulled from the waters.
The soft crunch and drip of someone stepping
carefully
around the knife-edged spires of cliff.
The soothesong opened her eyes
to the endless,
soul-bright blue of
open
sky.
She tilted her head back a bit further,
offering a welcoming smile to the women
who carried a basket for their gentled dragon.
As silversleek bodies dropped down a hole,
plopped down to the cavern below,
they could both hear the quick-slice of water splashing.
The soothesong closed her eyes once more,
fingers tip-tapping a happy song
while her sister fed a shadow
with long teeth
and terribly bright eyes.
I can read all the words
and not detect their meanings,
sit and watch the systems fall
in their up and downswings,
fiddle with a plan and then
quickly work around it
much as many may suspect
and never find their culprit;
sooner should I understand
the effects of my labor
as entrails of a fallen dove
splayed by one skilled augur
in time, and in all due course,
with steadiness, and no remorse–
until bloodstained hands are clean
will I know what these words mean?
Eddie’s rabbit choked on a carrot
sounds like a joke–it ain’t
i was the one feeding it to him,
he died–now he’s a saint
Eddie got mad and chased me outside,
pushed me down on his lawn
punched me in the face–stomach, too,
punched me ’till blood was drawn
Eddie used to be my very best friend,
but now, every day, at school
he looks at me mean, but he won’t talk
and the girls think he’s moody and cool
Eddie don’t eat carrots no more,
I think they make him sad
his rabbit was cute–his name was Syl–
that rabbit was all Eddie had
leave the grave green
against the fall of night
the blue salt road
gently by the shore
dancing bears
so brave, young, and handsome
the seventh function of language
tried by fire
a box of frogs
the heart’s invisible furies
guns of outlaws
kitchen knife skills
nourishing broth
grain of truth
seeing flowers
open house for butterflies
