Posts for June 8, 2023 (page 7)

I
Go softly and meekly on to your death
stoically, unfussily, no rattling last breath

Project peace, happiness and always good cheer
tell those you love what they want to hear

Rage not, no never, against the dying of the light
don’t argue, don’t fret, and good heavens don’t fight

Go sweetly and quietly on to your rest
you’ve earned it my dear, you’ve passed the great test

II
Die messily and loudly, rage all you want
make your last words an undying taunt

Be angry, regretful, rue every choice
be scared, be worried, use your loud voice

Rattle, and rasp, give your loved ones a start
let your last words be true, aim straight for the heart 

Go whatever way you want on to your rest
You’ve earned it my dear, life’s not a test

Yellow tags hang
by rubber bands
on the doorknobs
of every apartment.
Maintenance is coming
to inspect units for damages,
water leaks draining money.
Poses all kinds of problems for me.
There are things within these walls
I don’t want a single soul to see;
empty beer bottles and fast food sacks,
mountains of unwashed laundry, mold. Rot.
This will be my entire weekend or it would be
if I didn’t promise my nephew to go watch his base
ball tournament all the way up in Jefferson, Indiana,
not that this excitement is a burden in itself. Not at all
until the brakes start scraping right before I turn
into the ballpark parking lot an hour and a half away from
home. A home I really really need to get back to. I worry, can
the car even make it? It occurs to me as I drive that I’m al-
ready overdue for an oil change. Just another embarrassment
need to call first thing Monday but no, no! I don’t want it, don’t like
talking on the phone. Can’t God just take something away? Fuck!
I’m ten miles under the speed limit and needed to be there yesterday
tap the brakes tap the brakes tap the brakes don’t slam
slam the lid on the storage container hiding still unwashed laundry, sweep
glass of a bottle I shattered three weeks ago and stepped in twice,
cutting my soles like my soul was cut when she never texted.
Still see her at work, say hello, good morning like where the hell is your heart?
See her smile, see her laugh barbed beauty, see her talk with other guys
see my mechanic on Thursday we made it. Crawled through every cringing
red light stop. Collapse in the waiting room staring at the wall,
settling, just like I will tonight in a bed I made
before work this morning. Mechanic says
Yeah we can get it done today.

Sleep.                              Calm.
                   Rest.                             Peace.
                                   Serenity.

You are never
               as far away
                          as you think you are,

                                                           never 
                             so far from home
       that you can’t return.

fly in from the North
strut around a backyard pond
her mate now arrives
slate-winged, sleek-necked, full-throated
fowl love endures the air miles

All it took was a warning
    that I was leaving for good
        to make you trot out the big guns
            chiropractic adjustments for rottweilers
                brutalist architecture from the seventies
                    that American Apparel girl in just tights

                                            They all seem to say look how
                                                    well we know you, see how
                                                        happy you can be but based
                                                                    on your recent activity
                                                                        we see that you’re not so
                                                                            we have an app for that

                                                                                      But I’ve met someone else
                                                                                                I can reach them without
                                                                                                            mounting your paywall
                                                                                                    or sacrificing my essence
                                                                                      their only demand is that I stay
                                                                                   rooted in the here and now

                                                            So I run to them with my teeth out
                                                        fingers cutting through the breeze
                                                    instead of glued to the glass that
                                                you employ to keep me pinned
                                            to all the insecurities that
                                        you continue to reinforce

                        Sensing defeat you reveal an ace
                    ragdoll kittens being introduced
                to their forever homes
            they seem to say
        don’t leave baby
  no one knows you

like we do.

I run past the edge of town towards the last stretch of uneven paved roads
a familiar emptiness swallows the sun-bleached fields 
and the moment my toes lose the blacktop and tap loose dirt 
I change course to avoid the dust rising to meet my breath.
I stomp heat-fed crabgrass–
each blade crisping, crunching, whisping behind me
longer pieces slice my ankles, creating razor-sharp reminders that I am not alone

The miles pass with ease as the sun stretches across the morning sky
I watch cows graze, their tails swatting flies that follow on instinct
and I wonder when I last followed something or someone with my own intuition?

My heart and mind synchronize when I find a natural rhythm,
the trail unrolls itself behind me as sweat droplets fall from my body like fairy-tale breadcrumbs that I fear will evaporate and erase my navigable path home.
I drop my head when the wind attempts to blow away those precious paper towns
I create on invisible maps I keep in my pocket to mark my own safe harbors

These moments pass as my legs kick faster,
signaling to my heart that the inner compass is not broken, but muted:

Listen.
Feel.
Trust.

The magnetic attraction intensifies, pulling me closer to myself
back where the pavement and the dirt meet,
where man-made hardness touches softer, stronger natural ground–
a ground which I long to stand as I become
the blade of grass defying all in the space between. 

kentucky home

in the fading sunshine,
      feeling wild of mind,
a detroit born girl
      rides down country          roads
      in a red
thunderbird.

early summer teases
flower      scented     breezes,
the temperature a mild
70 degrees.                      finally…

the detroit girl     

can breathe.

ahhh…            yes, please.

the sun warms red barns,
behind miles     and      miles
        of white fenced horse farms
where lazy cows roam,

she decides
                                                  to put
                     the rag top down.
             and     leave the gps alone

cruising through
         back country roads,
no particular
place to go,                finally…      I know:

                           this detroit born girl
             a wanderer not lost,

    has made kentucky home.

Certainly, here’s a villanelle for you. Villanelles have a very specific form that consists of 19 lines with a repeating rhyme and refrain:

In the garden where the roses bloom,
Underneath the silver moon’s soft light,
There whispers the evening’s sweet perfume.

In shadows cast by night’s own loom,
Silent tales are spun in the cool night,
In the garden where the roses bloom.

Petals soft as a lover’s plume,
Glow like embers, red and bright,
There whispers the evening’s sweet perfume.

Night’s song in the quiet gloom,
Hummed by creatures hidden from sight,
In the garden where the roses bloom.

The stars above, in their endless room,
Bear witness to this tender rite,
There whispers the evening’s sweet perfume.

And so, in the gentle gloam,
Beneath the cloak of endless night,
In the garden where the roses bloom,
There whispers the evening’s sweet perfume.

image generated by entering this poem into Midjourney

The morning smell of her.

She’s only been gone three days

and I miss her so.

We have a mockingbird at our house
it sings me awake each morning

strings of stolen tunes
frantic calls and melodies

cast before sun’s heat sears the air
before I’m fully aware

and could just as easily be laying
back in my childhood bed

listening to those same sutured songs.