Posts for June 28, 2020 (page 3)

My phone babbles.  Informs me I live in Bondville—
a ghost town— adds it to my favorites.  At light of day,
it inquires “How is the Dollar General?”
where I’ve never gone.  It declares
“Traffic is moderate” on my dead end road.   
My phone is an alarmist, haunted with Amber Alerts
from half the state away. It dings and bleeps
to warn of tornado, flood, the UV Index. 
My phone wants to make me safe again,
a well-warned, nervous wreck.   It suggests
I’ll be smarter, more connected, it has me in training,
earning some kind of rewards.  It can tell me
anything in any language.  It translates,
it defines, it predicates and predicts. 
It anticipates, based on some universal  
logarithm.  But, as particular, peculiar,  
and irregular as I am,  I find myself,
when I resist this phoney or when it fails me,
left in complete isolation, utter
ignorance and unaccountable freedom. 

Stephen Chobosky wrote the words “We accept the love we think we deserve” in The Perks of Being a Wallflower and those words hit me like one of your slaps across my face
Like an unexpecting gut punch after suffering through your harsh words

We accept the love we think we deserve because we’ve never seen it any other way. We don’t know what healthy love looks like when we’ve only seen love in the bright light of gaslights.

We accept that love because we were raised in the back of cars shuffled between parents who didn’t understand us. How could they understand us when we were begging for love they didn’t know how to give?

We accept that love because we think we deserve the backhanded remarks and teeth marks of lovers. How can you love someone without abuse? Is it really love if it doesn’t feel like an anxiety attack?

We accept that love until it kills us or we learn to grow into new kinds of love. Love that accepts us back. Until we learn that we don’t derserve pain, we deserve all the things that rom coms promised us and more. We deserve safety, security, and partnership.

I reject that love I used to think I derserved.

a crystal fog descends
on a stale, stagnant soul.
the cavalry is coming.
fury-filled.
fear-fueled.
a group of lone wolves
gathering bones.
the sun goes down-
the peaks turn red.
slaughter erupts like a virus.

One  

I took the dog for a walk before bed, the day’s heat having kept us in. This happens as we both grow old. About half-way through, the wind shifted and lifted, clouds began to hide the full moon and ocean of stars, all this joined by a quick drop in the temperature. Later, snug under a blanket, I woke to listen to rain on the roof, thunder through the walls, like I did so long ago as a child. In the morning, the ground was still dry and cracked. Now I wonder if storms, in dying, leave behind spirits to revisit us.    

Two  

I woke to some sound an hour or so before the first, false dawn, some mix of tears falling and lips parting in a smile. There was a woman — you — sitting faintly on the side of the bed I always leave empty. Frozen in time, the contours of your face blended with the darkness of the room and the bleakness of my missing you. The sounds came not from you, but from my dreams. In the morning, any evidence of this outside my heart was gone like last week’s spectral storm.    

Three  

Working in the woods, clearing deadfall to dry and burn come late Autumn, trying to clear the past from my head with no success, I find myself talking with you, asking how things are on the other side, beckoning answers for the sound of your voice, the breath of your whisper in my ear. The closest reply is a ghostly smell of cigarette smoke among the trees, perhaps carried on the wind, perhaps remembered, maybe a sign that you’ve been listening.  

I work a puzzle
sudoku, kenken, crossword
one is not enough

I pen a poem
pantoum, sonnet, haiku, fib
muse prods another

poems and puzzles
resemble salted peanuts
one does not suffice

This is not. The poem you thought.
It was going to be. This is not.
The poem. It might have been.
This can only be. The poem.
You make it. Every time.
A different poem. Depending.
Where you stop. This will be.
Any poem you want. To read.

-from an “Arco: How to Write Poetry-Third Edition” exercise

stain my skin in tones of the earth, tones of home
stain the wine glass rim
stain the rosy cheek back of the palm dragging blood red cab’
stain my lips with the lipstick of the week, whatever’s in season
paint in wtf-bright Pikachu yellow, Elvira mid-summer’s night, mud-mood espresso coffee 
Mycenean-adobe Crimson, Electric-Cleopatra blue, Venician-vacation wine
stain the senses
taste the rainbow painted before the cusp of the tongue
if you dare 
take on a subscription until it starts to become a problem
no one ever mentions this though
the taste the of lipstick stain in broad strokes 
“Domination” tastes like rose scented play-doh, “mad love” liquid lacquer glazes like cinnamon bun scented candles and the deeper the red the further in the rose bushes you smudge
until thats all you smell

stain the page, while you’re at it 
stain the fingers
the crest of the palm too
stain it all in black, blue, red and green 
stain my hands like sewage workers boots
while heavy hand presses ink into a flood

and no one mentions this either, but
the smell the of ink
no one ever mentions the scent
the smell of dental equipment once the cap is gone
and that wafting aftermath of floating soot behind the squid, you grabbed too tightly

finally, the test tube aroma drifts away
when the ink settles between iris blots blasted onto the page in excess
and this I believe is the only stain that leaves no scent behind
not like berry wine
no that stays with you through the night 
like the stains you have yet to make
the words you have left to write

childhood summers
exist in my mind
as blurred nostolgia–

stepping out into the morning
and letting the air,
heavy with dew, fill

my body. my grandmother
and i would sit on her
porch, our hands wrapped

around mugs of coffee
and i’d lean my head
against her arm. after a bowl

of cereal, i’d nap under the quilts
of her bed. only the mornings
hold this poignancy,

everything else seems
to have the same
finiteness as the now.

From work straight to church
leaves me plenty of time
to sit reflective in the sanctuary,
a grace long denied.

Tears gather in my eyes
as divine love spills into my heart.
Peace pervades the pandemic induced walls
completely disrupting our lives.

God, how I miss the normal things
like the hymn books and the hymns,
the congregations joining hands in prayer,
people mingling after the service

but most of all, I’ve missed this chance
to sit in Your Holy presence
as I do this beautiful evening,
letting myself be Your child again.

Today marks one year
since a challenge to pray a rosary
every day for a week straight,
since I hadn’t said one in years.

This sparked an explosion of faith
with showers of wisdom
as I came more fully into who I am;
a disciple of Christ.

It was a tumultuous year.
You know all the nasty devils
that stood in the way of happiness,
how I had to rely on You for survival

and I will never forget
the way you saw me through those wars,
dressing my wounded spirit
when people inevitably failed.

God, you never stopped fighting beside me.
Armies of saints and angels
became my shelter against the hurricanes
that surely would have destroyed the old me.

When depression came crushing
and anxieties paralyzed me
and fear threatened to take all the light away,
You provided the courage to stand strong.

But out of all the blessings,
You, of course, saved the best for last
when I would need her most.
I promise to always love her the same way You do.

All of this flows through my mind
and with my sanctuary tears.
I have absolutely nothing to be afraid of
for my God has already won all of my wars.