Posts for 2020 (page 43)

In the time before she swallowed fear,

Walking through
the garden
in late evening
when the sun
slides behind
the hills and
its rays
spill over
highlighting
small slits of gold
in patterns
across the ground
transports me
back across
the years touching
each summer
leading up to now,
planting seeds
and weeding
and watching
and waiting.
I carefully place
my feet between
the rows of
cabbages
and kale,
onions
and beets
and basil.
Breathing in the
sweetness of
tilled dirt
and growing plants,
the cool air heavy
with dew, I soak in
those moments
with my feet
on the earth
and my head
playing memories
stretched across
my days.

Einstein’s desk,
the day after he died,
was much like Einstein’s desk
the day before he died.
Genius and clutter
survive
what we cannot.
I hope the clutter 
I leave behind
will be worth enough

Yes, hon, hold my macchiato
and we can take a selfie.

Going on thirty-one, and so much
I never knew, secrets the universe
kept hidden just out of view:

like how a real man could want
to walk the streets of your hometown
holding tightly onto your hand;

the way the old All-American Rejects
song sounds to you on the radio now,
ringing shame against your eardrums,

nothing reminiscent of the person
sitting beside you in the coffee shop
holding your steaming mug.

Yes, hon, let’s take a selfie.
Let’s pin up this moment
with a grin, save it for a day

when we might forget
what it feels like to be held,
by hand and by heart,

forever in a photo full of secrets
we’ll whisper to each other in the dark. 

It is almost
spring,
almost
the time
of
change.
I guess
that means
I should be
like the
cherry blossom trees
and
bloom
softer
and
brighter.

Someone lives on the right,
Someone lives on the left,
In between is the monument of “HAMBLETONIAN,
THE GREAT PROGENITOR OF TROTTERS.”

Hambletonian was a horse,
The monument was erected in his memory
In Chester, New York.
It stands in a small lot between two residential houses,
Resembling a small Washington Monument.

It is unlikely that anyone wants to tear it down.
It is also unlikely that many people even know about it.
But two households live next-door to it,
So they know about it.

I hold my fish up to the sky and squint
beyond it to compare colors, mark

how the shadows that cast billows
of cumulus in relief resemble scales,

notice that the daylight moon exactly
matches the fisheye reflected light.

Most every girl joins a cult 
at least once in their lives

Fixation runs in our blood
As we feast on validation

We run in packs
We run from rules
We run from the boyfriends
We never wanted

Sad Girl
Bad girl
Scared girl
Mad girl

Unspoken dress code
Of Kate Spade, Sperry’s
Uggs & American Eagle

One unit
Operating unknown
From the rest

(Title from “Ways to Sustain” in “How to Dress a Fish” by Abigail Chabitnoy)

We all do our part:
The charge today is to act
as a human shield.

Growing up,
I had practice
as a chi buffer. I’ll start there.

It was never them.
Never about them.
In Feng Shui you must take
measures if the front door opens
to a back door or open window.

The chi runs away.
The chi is faultless.

We all do our part:
Enhance or multiply energy
with a mirror.

One must never tend to their quick,
wild chi by empowering
an exit point.

It was a flaw in
my childhood home:
A front door,
a small entry
direct to a sliding glass door.

Chi only chased its tail.
Chi was confused at that entry.
I think. Because

it was lack of knowing:
The heirloom mirror beside the entry.
But thick blinds and a rug
for mud banked what chi it could.

It was stylistic. A defect:
Upstairs the wall of mirrors amplified the
kitchen table’s chi and the piano
with my grandmother’s painting on top.

The percussion of
summer green bean snapping
and music lessons and
sharp remarks.

The chi itself is blameless.
At that table I learned.
I learned what I unlearn daily:
I was convinced I could protect
everyone else’s chi.

i got exactly

what i wanted

from tonight.

and now my writing

has become so dull.

i sometimes wonder

if i was ever in love

with you at all,

or if i was in love

with using you

to make a metaphor

out of me.