Posts for 2020 (page 111)

This summer
I am haunted
By the ghosts of summers past. 

Echoes of waves,
Salt water drying
Sticky on my skin. 
Hammock ropes digging
Into my arms and legs. 
Showering outside-
The freedom
Of being naked outdoors
But still hidden,
Sunshine on skin that never sees it. 

Deep night in the country. 
Stars brighter than you ever expect
Insects and bullfrogs louder 
Than you ever remember
When you leave
The noise and light pollution
Of the city behind. 

Summer present is
Masks and people
Too far away to hug. 

I’ll have to wait for
Summers future
Before I’m free of ghosts again. 

Nag a bit more about
the nest on my head,
the baggy fit of my tee,
the scuffs and mysterious
blue stain on my white sneaks

Bother me some about
the polite way to offer an
insightful opinion or,
better yet,
the perfectly proper closed mouth

Offer your incredibly poised justification as to how
the obsequious nature of girlishness,
so called Southern Charm,
is distinguished from servitude

This book, this pocket guide
on being a lady, 
is useless to me

I’m a woman

No less than those
righteously prim mannequins
painfully described on pages
that make better kindling than content 

That’s just my unruly opinion

Does this come with a gift receipt?

The baby looked hard at the sky–a smoky purple,
thin reddish clouds passing fast—
she peered, she stared, aghast, and rapt at
an evening something I couldn’t see.  

Don’t concentrate your finger curl at me
because I am not an obedient house pet.

I cannot be fixed, willed, or trained.

What kind of animal am I?

One that conceals herself in thick summer brush,
and observes your exaggerated movements.

A seductive beast whose silent stealth and stalk
shake the dirt beneath your weak walk.

An animal who, upon instinct,
selects the precise moment when you think you’ve made the catch,
to leap through the air 
gnash at your naked neck,
puncture your putride pride,
lick your bones clean
and bury your fingers,
so you know that I am not at all as I seem.  

She signed me up
for swim lessons,
Pine Lakes Swim Club,
Saturday morning
instead of cleaning house
and other chores.
She drove me
past Bernice’s garden center,
past the old Acme,
and past the liquor store
where she bought
bottles of Thunderbird
in grassy-green bottles.

We called it a swim club,
but it was nothing more 
than a lake with a ring of sand,
and a couple of diving boards.
I was the oldest kid in the class,
conscious of my hand-me-down suit
tight around the legs,
which ballooned out like sausages, 
all pink and puffy,
and my curly hair stuffed
into a rubber bathing cap
barely able to contain it.

I really tried to listen to the instructor,
but all I could hear was my heart
breaking across the water
and the lapping of shame in my ears.

                                    –a found poem

Dear friends and colleagues:
I retired after a lifetime teaching at the University.
Are there any available rights or privileges for retirees?
Use of an office? Library? Parking? Computer?

I have been served notice to turn in my keys on January 6.
Moving books and papers out of my office
with such short notice seems mean-spirited to me.

Dear professor:
The University, in recognition of substantial and sustained
contributions to academic disciplines and to the University,
may grant the title “Emeritus” to persons meeting

the qualifications set forth in the policy.
Conferring of Emeritus is not automatic upon retirement
and may be conferred only upon approval

through the process described in the policy.
The Emeritus understands that there is no renumeration
received by the holder of the title.

I too have spent years

looking for the roots             of what went wrong

trying to comprehend early and targic death

seeking to make amends

desperate for peace

My face might appear unscarred

but my heart reveals a very different truth

I cherish your vision of the savage plow of history      creating a seedbed for a green and growing season to come

This hope is my new found prayer

This poem was inspired by Parker J. Palmers poem “Harrowing” in his book On The Brink of Everything   via writing prompt from Leslie Dodd. 

sometimes I feel so damn good 
that I am near supernova
could die right then at that moment and
whatever animates me could explode into a thousand million particles of light and energy
and dissipate across the earth
merging with every person animal tree flower
fusing with my lover’s energy at last
o my soul

Do you ever think of the music you gave me?
Of the lyrics that sank into my skin
Of the beats that sounded like your heart
Do you remember the words we gave each other?

Because I do with a bittersweetness
I wish I could have loved you like those songs

Mom loves to hear the South Pole phone calls.

That’s where Dad makes sure all the proper
pieces will fit together, working from Dove Valley, now more
precisely his home in a suburb south of Denver.

I had a world map with pins in it for all the pen pals I had
as a teenager. I miss that reverence for geography, the
tranquility of letters exchanged. My palm over paper.

One pin in New York state. I didn’t dream
up someone who would have spent a life there
and fall in love with me as much as you, didn’t know what
I wanted from anyone, even myself, or from the idea of love.

I knew places I wanted to travel to. Some were pinned. Some
I might only call.
Back in my bedroom with the yellow painted walls, I didn’t know
anyone then or now reaching out to me from
the South Pole yet sometimes it could almost be you are that far away.