Posts for June 4, 2023 (page 7)

Branches and leaves twirl

like girls jumping rope, dance and 

prance to tease the wind.

Should have been a weekend of lace
chrysanthemum and hollyhock,
maybe a pair of citrine or moonstone earrings.

Instead, the diamonds have all fallen out,
lost in the dirt of a decrepit garden
full of dessicated daffodils.

Victims of internecine insecurities,
you were afraid our house of cards 
would collapse if not built fast enough

while I was too weak to push denial,
risking wrath to stop the careening
before you drained every drop of my spirit.

Lines in my voice still cut to this day.
No. I will not be coming home, and
I do feel like I’m losing a friend.

Now a twist of fate somehow has me
stumbling into a family portrait,
children surrounding your new name.

Those children suggest candy or iron,
sweetness, strength, and perhaps most fittingly
the charm of majestic amethyst.

I linger on the image only for a moment
before drinking again from my browning cup, dreaming
of one day getting just two cards to stand together.

I wish for something
certainty, an answer
to have something which is true, solid, unwavering
and sure, yes, I do have that in aspects
but not in the entirety and that’s what I desire

until
I consider the wildflowers blooming on the next block
they drift back and forth in the wind
unconcerned
returning each year
a mish mash of colors and shapes
red, yellow, blue
primaries in the pastel world of painted bricks
out of place, perhaps, amongst the roses and daylilies

they return each year, despite no written arrangement
the Universe’s plan intervenes and they bloom
a lesson, I confirm
for me and my constant quest
     keep walking and see what life brings

The price of a late sleep
hovers over the bricks
a humid curtain
interrupted by dry, tall,
jagged-leafed weeds.

Reheated coffee in 
pajama pants and
flip flops, the 
payoff of
ten
long
months. 

You can tell how old this homeplace is
by the outbuilding alone. Hand hewn logs,
mud chinking bleached white by the years.
A Kentucky lean to leaning against nothing,
walls still plumb and level, and the roof line, if the
roof was there, measuring a little lower
in height than one that might be built today.

The farmhouse sits back on the one lane county road
facing the west, overlooking a hayfield
laying low and flat just above where the waters
of Red Lick Creek run to Station Camp. And this field
will to this day spill a long and heavy rain into
a shallow flood that fords across the old road
out of Jinx Holler into the valley beyond.

One side of the peaked metal roof, the side facing
the field, is a mottle of silver rusted to
sienna with gray streaks going to white still bright
in spots in the noonday sun. Crushed tin mailbox mouth
open on the ground. Porch sagging, gutters fallen,
one snagged and hanging parallel to white columns
faithfully upholding the sorrows of time.

Around a bend in the road, where the creek deepens
and the banks grow steep, sits a new A-Frame west coast
type house built with what looks like redwood but likely
is stained yellow pine. Sitting half way up the ridge,
driveway paved, big double paned windows with a view
of the valley priced out of reach. A store bought shed
and a new plank fence for one lonely grass-fat horse.

Time after time places change and stay the same.
The old house along the Murphy Ford Road contrasts
but does not differ from the new one squatting there.
We think outsiders walk over and take our things,
but it’s the passing days that give and take away
the ground we stand on. We all lose our place soon
enough to the thievery of eternal time.

A friend quotes Cheryl Strayed…

And so I climbed the hill in darkness.
And waited for first light.
And climbed again at sundown
And scampered down in night.

I packed a paperback Neruda
a worn chapbook of Plath
I studied every fallen leaf
that fell along my path.

I danced to drumbeats
on the square,
and sipped the sweetest rum,
the sticky scent that filled the air,
expanded in my lungs,

the flames soared high,
cracked and whipped
in jubilant wild plume,
above the rollicking
chants of joy,
a brilliant honey moon.

Like a wolf I hunted her,
deep into the night,
wore a worried haggard trail
in search of beauty’s sight.

Exhausted I fell sleeping
on a bed of grass,
a stream beside me
trickled dreams,
fleeting fast,
intimations
of an infinite love,

an intimacy
unsurpassed,
which like all
things infinite,
but for the shortest
glorious moment
lasts.

Latent memories circle
in viridescent waters
lurk in murky depths

Obscured beneath protection
of entangled roots
bright fleeting flashes

Gone before I can hook
them with my inner eye 
looking for forms refracted

A frustrating half-step ahead
of my tickling fingers
impatient

For the barest brush
of scales against skin
I will grasp the gills

Jerk one to the surface
silvery-slick and wriggling
under scrutiny

Bite off its head and let it leak
raw onto these pages
before I forget again

From the age of five,
I have had person after person
Take my body
And do what they’d like with it.

Telling me to keep quiet,
That it’ll all be over soon.
Telling me to keep it our little secret,
That this was something special.
Telling me that they were doing me a favor,
And that I’d thank them later.

Permission was never asked for,
Nor was it ever given.
These things have caused my body
To feel like a prison.

It takes at least both of my hands,
And most of my memory
To recount what my life has been.

against the hot Summer pavement
like roadkill, in amazement
Roll me in the dirt
in carpets clad with creases and
cockroaches; there are cockroaches everywhere.

Everywhere you drag me, there will be vermin
There will be unease and eclectic architecture
The world will bend to our will
as long as you hold my cold, karmic carrion

Drag me. Drag me across the hot summer pavement on Sundays
Bend my bones until I am on my knees
until my blisters burn away in the sun
and become bruises, not burdens

I am a burden becoming beautiful
If you stay for a second I’ll be better,
I’m just not better yet.

Calendars were a vital fixture
On the thin walls of my childhood home
All information of any importance
Filled the daily squares, page after page

In the kitchen hung the Old Farmer’s Almanac calendar
A yearly gift from the bank
Telling us when to plant the corn and potatoes
When the first frost would come
And if it was a good day to fish

In the living room hung the telephone company calendar
With bright, beautiful pictures each month
According to the season or holiday
The blank squares were quickly filled
With birthdays and anniversaries of the whole family
Before it was even placed on the nail
Where it would remain for the year 

As days passed, other squares filled in
With appointments and events
Shots at the health department
Vacation Bible school, church Christmas play 
At year’s end, the calendars,
Well-worn and filled with mama’s neat handwriting,
We’re placed in a box to be kept
As a small, simple piece of family history 

Years later me and mama looked through
The box of old calendars
Mama picked up a calendar
And slowly turned the pages
Perhaps remembering

Then I saw a smile slowly appear
On Mama’s face and she laughed softly
She turned the calendar so I could see
July 23rd, in my mama’s handwriting
“It rained today”

A simple, yet curious 
Almost cryptic message 
It surely was important 
At one time
On that day
But the secret remains always
In the faded, yellowed pages