Posts for 2020 (page 156)

No business casual to launder
or Monday to dread. Instead
a chance for firsts:
Unplanned puppies frolic
on the grass. Kiddie pools proliferate.

You chalk a kitty design on the driveway,
consider a mural on the wall.
Baby sparrows hover like hummingbirds.
Paper golden angels hang in the window.
You feed the twin hens.
Our son plants sunflower seeds,
requests Grandma’s sour cream cake.
I unearth a dusty recipe box.
We inflate our bike tires. 
I knit a scarf, smell the peonies,
watch crows harass
a hawk in the treetops,
fly a kite, observe robins
in the birdbath, uncover
yeast in the cupboard,
bake bread, set the table
with red tulips, linger
over conversation, play scrabble
under the swamp oak
while drinking mint juleps.

Would you walk
Walk with me
On my way
To get free
Of these traps
Eating me
Bellicose
Gnashing teeth

i’m sick and unsick and not sick enough to die

i’m so sick of being skin

so i want—no, demand

no hands to plant

on no thighs to fatten

and no eyes to water

no, no heart to fertilize

nor stomach to feed

nor feet to wonder

all that flesh and shit can fill a petty pit and live forever six feet

understand

this isn’t a deathwish but a ghostwish

i want to be footless and footloose

and free from all this fucking flesh

i’m tired of standing up

and of the gravity that chalks my bones up, too

when the world could be the one who has to chock up my gravestone

against the ground’s grave and greedy weight

because the world in its grey grief waits for me to fill it

so can i be a ghost already

i want to be the empty spot that the world cannot fill

on kayak float creek
sunday evening june
summer early visits,
rapidly descended
white cap splash
a turtle thrusts itself
from lime stone rock
but not before we make
direct eye contact.
he submerged,
I a surface dweller,
for today a least.
how deep flows
our silent dialogue? 

George Carlin’s routine featured a fictitious book club that included the titles:
“Rid Yourself of Doubt–or Should You?,” “Reorganizing Your Pockets,” “Why Hawaii and Norway Are Not Near Each Other” and “How to Kill a Rat With an Oboe.”
Mr. Carlin is no longer with us.

Here are books I’d like to read that haven’t been written yet:
“Save Your Toenail Clippings,”
“How Muenster Cheese Saved My Marriage,”
“The World According to My Idiot Son-in-Law,”
“Weaning Myself off of Food in Thirty Days,”
“Zen and the Art of Corn and Callous Removal,”
“Changing the World One Spatula at a Time,”
“The Mathlete I Couldn’t Count On,”
And “Why Sweden and Norway Are Next to Each Other.”

If any of these turn out to be real titles of real books,
My real apologies.

Throws me off balance
I slip on slick grass. You say
Maybe you’re too polite to be a poet
Too nice to learn to slice
Off the ends of leaves
As you yank away
The ivy from the house,
Tough old vines
Clung on like ticks attached
To the underarm

My silence is the knife
You need to finish the job

Excess her specialty: too much
food, drink, attitude.  Passionate
in idolizing celebrity and if her hero
was a woman athlete, all the better.
She loved to pose with her best friend
and post for the world to see.
Everything in her life a superlative,
the best or the worst.  Fiercely loyal,
she celebrated the birthday
of her pets years after their deaths.

She delighted in wheelies
on ice and preferred riding her chopper
with no helmet, the better to feel
the breeze in her hair.
She had pride in everything:
the best boat, car, yard, neighbors. 
Under a tough facade, quick to cry,
blubbering over any loss or injustice.

When she got sick she thought
if only she got a new fridge
that would get things cold
enough, all would be well.
And if she could get chicken
noodle soup hot enough
she would be strong again.

Honeybees plunge their stinger deeply
die 
never to harm again.
Not that I wish someone to 
die
when they cause pain.
Potential lies within me
to diminish their sting.
En guard
Advance
Lunge
Counter parry
Stopthrust
Disengage
from
apoptosis.

next door dog/ is barking/ again/
incessantly/ sounds like/
let  me  in/ let  me  in

why not just/ plop down/
on warm wood deck/ sniff
infinite green/ let bee hum/ lull/
linger/ in long lazy stretch/
sunshine lacing/ in and out/
of leaf waves

what is this want/ of stale/
artificial cool/ denied sunlight/
TV blair?

there/ it’s stopped/ no more
jarring/ poor dog/ lost
to nature/ like the human/
it lives with

A farmer’s market find-
At home, I liberate the herb
From its plastic confinement
My fingers eternally eager
For the lush sculpt of soil                              
The tangle of root and pulse                               
As I transport it to a larger pot
Its spirit soft and savory  

If only the homophone
Were as simple to manage   
If only I could take that time
Within my hands and shape it
To these hungered wants  

Once more
Looking into someone’s eyes without a Zoom lens
Hugging friends gathered around a meal
At her bedside soothing the faded hand          
Kissing his shoulder on a summer morning
In the midst of whippoorwills igniting the stars
Cherishing the baby burbling in my arms
Your laugh in the cave we discovered
Sharing moonlight before he went to war  

But life moves on      as it should
As it must  

I brush the earth off my fingers
Thank herb and moment
And head into the day