Posts for June 5, 2023 (page 2)

Today I dug in my flowerbed.
My goal was to pull up vines and roots that held on for dear life. 
I begged and pleaded – let go. My garden needed to be weeded.
Pulling and tugging I wouldn’t be defeated. Shovel in hand I never retreated.
Deeper and deeper the shovel’s blade went.
Piercing the soil till something it did hit.
What could it be?
I couldn’t yet see.
There it was I made a groan.
I didn’t expect that – It was a bone.
Was it human, animal, or dinosaur?
I watch enough CSI to know not to touch the remains.
I didn’t have an evidence bag, but a Ziploc works all the same.
No ability to run a DNA Test.
As for me, I have to guess.
What’s your answer,
Human, animal, or dinosaur?
What bone did you pick?

rest your hand, here

                  be still
        slowly

insert;                           away

                      tomorrow,
                                                       i will

          cry

5: The Locked Tomb (Tamsyn Muir)

God is          the bones, the sinews, the frame

                                                     on which

                                                     the universe

                                                     hangs.

He’s          all flesh resewn, all blood renewed,

                                                     a name

                                                     unsullied

                                                     by…? um, (what?

                                                     blame, I guess?)

God is, okay, maybe God isn’t that filigree

and golden filth. maybe He speaks with a

human voice, and maybe He’s kind of nice?

actually? and like, kinda handsome, but

also kind of just the king of all reality and

ancient, exhaustive bone-tiredness, and

well, He’s more of a dad than an emperor?

God, yes, God is my father

          (oh, Christ, that’s not good.

          who the hell has a good

          relationship with their father?

          who wants to tear through

                       love’s guts

          only for their father to tell them,

          ‘Good job, here’s more guts

          to tear through, sport.’

                        oh but love’s only in your guts

          now, and the entrails he folds into your hands

          are literally just everyone else’s, like,

          hopes and morals and sanity and stuff??)

maybe he’s just trying his best.

oh fuck

god is just some guy

                         ^that

okay, okay, so god is REDACTED,

and if ten thousand years can’t cure

the answerless void of

          Is love worth loving if it’s just

          going to turn into a sword?

or

          Why can’t I be content in a body

          and hold my friends?

then why is time wasted on assholes instead of on the likes of

                                                  us??

but this morning, a beautiful cool morning,
I went for a walk around the neighborhood
and there on the sidewalk, on North Elm,
was a pile of papers, white 8 ½ by 11
stapled in the corner, fresh and clean.
Of course, I had to pick it up
and right away I knew what it was.
It seems poor Henry had been
to the Emergency Room late last night.

I really didn’t mean to snoop
but there right on the front page
it said he went in with chest pains.
His blood pressure was 140/90.
They prescribed steroids and referred him
to an Ear, Nose and Throat specialist.
So what was I supposed to do?

If you know me, you know I’m the kind
who not only takes my shopping cart
to the corral in the Walmart parking lot
but then tries to straighten up all the other carts.

So there I was on North Elm
right across from the hospital
and I knew what I had to do.
It’s all I could do for poor Henry.

The year the angel fell
                                                                                ceramic and sharp-winged
from the shelf above me,

it was Christmas Eve
                                                                                all that pristine winter.
Family gathered loud,

the cowboy record sang
                                                                                up on the housetop click click click
I heard a series of gasps and suddenly

she was in my hands –
                                                                                no one knew how she stumbled –
somehow I corrected my position

just enough to reach out and
                                                                                Lord we all stumble sometimes
to not get hurt in the fall.                                       

Southward into the indescribable
foglike something that gathers beneath the trees
I crest a hill to reveal the sun, orange and distinct,
above empty farmland in the distance.

This is the moment I know what I made a wrong turn for:

The fields in their American two-lane road version of Europe
glinting in the impressionist style, with the way the golden wildflowers
grow at the exact shade to enhance the warm glow
like they were made for this one minute.

I return to the familiar question: why would one be so unkind
as to divide weeds from flowers, to designate the ones that grow on their own
as something to be cut away, trespassers
to their own field?

Why not plant dandelions in the windowsills?

Be careful who you
tie yourself to.
Their shoes rarely fit
and you’re left
with blisters
from the walk.

I look in the rear view mirror

On a warm, sunny day,

A perfect day,

I smile and feel real happiness

Life’s been good,

And then I feel the small flicker

In my heart, the hole that’s still there

I catch myself missing my sadness,

She’s comforting, familiar, warm

I find when I’m sad the world seems,

Not only more terrifying, and boring,

But beautiful, it confuses me

I envy myself in sadness

I realize we never really get over or move on

From the things that dug that hole

But we fill it with soil

And yellow tulips,

We water it with laughter,

And chase the sun to make the flowers grow

The hole will always be there

To run to or to run from

We can visit our sadness,

When need be

We can choose to sit and smell the flowers

Instead of digging a deeper hole

And jumping

That neighbor boy whose name I don’t know
spends hours skittering up and down,
leaping off and scaling ‘em again,
perpetually climbing a set of trailer steps
to nowhere. 
Lord knows where they came from
but they get plenty use. 
He drags them all over the overgrown yard. 
He can’t be more than eight or nine now
and I suspect he’s gone plumb feral. 
Shirtless and straining with sweat, 
wearing nothing but a look of determination 
and a pair of shorts and cowboy boots, 
he shoves the steps close to the creek as he can get. 
Climbs up, leans out over the concrete culvert… 

And that’s when I had to close the curtains. 
Well, after he added a rusty hand saw 
to his delicate balancing act. 
We’ve only had one conversation in three years — 
“What’s your doggie’s name?” I hollered.
“That’s Nikki,” he calmly replied,
“She ate her puppies one time. All five of ‘em.” 

i don’t want a quiet life.
each day i put on my old bones
and wait for something good
to happen. i think i am meant to watch
my life from a distance, like a painting
that only blurs as you get closer.

i wanted someone else’s face
to be yours but it wasn’t. like a heartbeat
i made the shape of desire plain
on my face. on my way back
i walked through a parking lot
in the dark, picturing your eyes

wide as searchlights.
i know there is a home
i crawl into at the end
of this. i know inside of it
is a field

and a girl running,
pushing the roots
even deeper in the ground