Posts for June 5, 2022 (page 2)

I take my grandson little Jack
to the pocket park on Kennedy Ave.
The new carpet of cedar chips
hasn’t arrived yet.
It’s one of those especially sunny
late spring mornings and someone
just mowed the grass across the way.
If I knew how to whistle, I would.

Jack’s hair is curlier than usual–
he looks so dear in that pale yellow sweater,
a hand-me-down knitted by someone,
that ended up in the bottom of a drawer
at my house.

I lift him into the baby swing 
(my back abides for a change)–
it looks like his little arms and legs
are sticking out of a bucket.
Happy just to look around, he knows 
somethings up, way way up,
when I look him in the eye, shout:
Are you ready? Are you super ready?

I pull the front of the swing
towards me, up
up up up
and let it go–
Jack’s face is so alive, brown eyes wide, 
mouth open, his curls unleashed,
a sound–
a squeal, a whoosh 

I tell my daughter about our little trek:
It’s as if it was the first time he’d been on a swing!
She answers: It was.

When I look at you,
I see messy humanity.
All soft skin and muscles,
talking about
alternate dimensions
on a Sunday afternoon,
while rain falls heavy
on the rooftop.

whomever uncoild the universe
didn’t leave instructions
on the upkeep of this whole thing
but there needs to be something done

I feel older than I should
everything that is out there
I’ve known over and over and over
every single person
is just saying the same things
with different faces

I wonder
if I could find a place
to slap the side 
like we did the televisions
when the static got too much
if this loop would break
and jolt us all free

Thank you
for the gift.

Expect a fill-in-the-blank, handwritten thank you note
with little to no distinction from 
the fifty others I will send out this week,
along with an item bearing equal or greater value 
to your gift.

And next week,
I’ll be awaiting your note
to start the cycle over again.

Love is a key to stopping gun violence. 
I can see from your expression that you do not agree. 
Think about this,
Love conquers all.
I hear ya, that sounds cliche’.
Yeah, but it’s true.
I don’t mean empty love.
I’m talking about real Love.
The kind that covers all and loves all.
All people.  
We care for them,
We protect them.
We don’t want them to be harmed,
We don’t want to harm them.  
Do you love your neighbor as you love yourself?
Society must love all the individuals it’s made of.
When it does,  It will close the door on hate related gun violence.

Road squirrel left seizing 
I’d be better to ram you
For the second time

Caramel molds itself into the crevices of my teeth
Like the aches carving their way 
Through my calves to my thighs. 

There are days when I can’t breathe
My sister calls it a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Don’t think; she rolls her eyes at me

I tell math students the same thing:
Start over- pull the working string.
Forget what you’ve learned so you can learn it again-

I forget how Carmel clings to my molars- 
Glues my mouth shut and rocks silent shivers 
down my jaw to my shoulders.

I make myself still; soreness is a form of movement.
I cough and forget I can’t breathe; 
I will learn it again.

A cedar waxwing
appeared today
in my backyard. 
A rare sighting,
for me,
my second.

My pulse quickened,
breath held. 

She  disappeared,
her masked eyes
like a thief. 

Why I am so angry
at the starling, 
but so happy
to see the
cedar waxwing?

“Once upon a time,
not a very long time ago nor very far away,
there lived a girl who was afraid to sleep…
for every time she closed her eyes dark things from
days best forgotten would drip from 
the corners of her mind to plague her dreams—
turning them into nightmares.” 

“What happened to the girl? 
Did she defeat her demons and sleep at last?” 

“Ah, on that I’m uncertain.
See, I haven’t lived through that part yet.”