Posts for June 1, 2022 (page 6)

You asked me if I was okay,
What a stupid question.
I’ve spent all my worry tokens
And won the prize of worrying what my family will do if I get shot
Some would say it’s part of being human,
Others would say it’s part of living in America.  

Blame the deppression all you want
We should know better by now,
But what am I gonna do about it?
Slap the guns out of our forefathers’ hands?
Give my sorry testimony that will get sympathy nods
But no real change?

Just this morning,
A friend joked that if she was going to get shot at school
It better be before math class.
I laughed along.
Knowing they didn’t check our bags that morning.
Cause how else do we deal with it all?

How else do we deal with knowing we’ve been abandoned.
Left to those drunken with power and bullets.
So don’t you dare ask if I’m okay.
Because you haven’t cast aside your gun yet.
And recognized that death is a right,
But gunfire doesn’t have to be.  

Pull up on things.
When they give out,
you will too.
When your chin hits,
rebounds and (wham!)
splits your skull a bit,
ask for a kiss.
Pull up on things.

i am wasted!

wasted

• potential
• beauty
• story

and wasted on wine.

it doesn’t make me sad,

but it makes me cry.

people don’t know yet.

people haven’t realized.

one day when the world wilts and wears away all of the petals sheltering me,

they’ll see the waste

and they’ll take my wine.

Talking Stream
River stones
Redwood reaching
Quiet beseeching  

Sunlight plays
Upon green leaves
Rocks, trees
All practicing, stillness  

While talking stream
Babbles on
Telling story                               

Jess Roat                           
Lexpomo.1

A summer hot and violent
Taught us how to warp time.
We sleep until the sting of sun
Hits our vacant pupils
At just the right angle.
Then the fever dreams 
Of crashing on the highway
Dissolve into the tepid rain
Like sugar pills; we are sweet
And we neglect the diagnosis.
We do nothing to help ourselves.
We rot in the noon heat on the tar
And find any way to hurt 
So we can feel real like we used to.
Ground ourselves in skin and bone,
We’ll prick the needle to prove its there,
Create a wound just to heal.
If we sew our bodies to the earth
We’ll never have to worry about our heads
Buoying us towards the night sky.

     Hearts of flint (and stone)

             like kaleidoscopic light

              spark in steady glow

How limited the precision of language, the metrics of marking time.   

Dare I mention the scarlet strips of leather looped around my ankle?

How I held my breath as their body came closer to the fire. Already I feel 

the aura of my own armor. 

Distance learning
Canvas lessons
Emotional training
PD sessions

Mother’s Alzehimers
Father’s devotion
Mother dying
Father’s seclusion

Covid restrictions
Voluntary masking
Social distancing
In class confusion

Daughter’s diagnosis
Diabetes dealing
Public unawareness
Disease unyielding

Covid testing
Quarentining
Mask wearing
Care giving

World distressing
Uncertainty festering
Decompressing
Mind needs resting

“Happy Summer!”

The ashes sang to me

As they skidded the pavement

Of the freshly manicured porch.

I grimace at the green stomach

My hound has adorned

Barking blissfully

Through the

Fresh cut lawn.

I chuckle remembering the

Wet green blades

Sticking from you toes.

You shook them off,

You jumped in the pool,

And you jumped on me.

You are summer, baby.

You shined so much light

That I was drenched in sweat.

You are the sun rays

Beaming on the cold water.

The ice chopped up

In the blender

Keeping your daiquiri cool

Enough that it lasts

Til your next bathroom break.

But you are still

Way passed tipsy.

You were the sunburn

You get after putting on

4 coats of sunscreen,

That blistered for days

And peeled for weeks.

The tick that latched on

Your scalp that you rip

Off of you,

And falls on the floor and

It will not die.

The steam from the hot air

Has fogged up my phone

As I struggle to write this.

Winter will always be my favorite season.

I live in a house
that holds one thousand windows
most will never see