* an acrostic written for day 100 of the Stafford poem-a-day challenge.
On a day begun in sleepy routine, do
Not worry how high your bread rises.
Every loaf like every minute
Hunts and finds its rightness, its
Unfamiliar beauty. And surely
No one should say this is a
Day like any other. Its bells
Ring a tune you will never
Ever hear again. Hold it to your heart,
Deem it right to linger, unlid its singing.
For summer solstice, I suggest
my favorite kiss-off:
Go kick rocks.
So
Go on.
Git now!
Get out of town!
Leave the earbuds.
Leave the damned phone!
Go
all the way to the river’s edge
then down to where the dry spell has uncovered a bed.
sun-dried mud-crusted just waiting for you to
kick rocks
Nudge some over with a foot.
Bend by the water willow
and reach into the river
to turn some rocks over with your fingers.
Pluck a few for the cup of your hand.
Thumb off algae and
let the river trickle away grit to reveal
limestone sandstone black bits of shale
shale tiny geode sandstone limestone
Choose one
a puzzle piece, it fits
cool and smooth
it kisses your palm,
breathes
stay,
rest
After summer solstice, mind skips troposphere,
wanders stratosphere where planes soar, leaps
up to exosphere—like it, I contract & expand
with the flares of time, the curling lazuli
& shooting blond of solar storms, & the slim
ribbons of stellar streams.
All around me silence peals in waves of nothing
a tin-tin-na-bu-la-tion tin-tin-na-bu-la-tion
like the copper cattail chimes
as they wave by our pond
in a rare June wind.
Far under my feet
sun sets in the narrow band
of a honey-&-pink horizon, preens
before evanescing below maple & redbud
where katydids purl with sliding wings & leaf bodies.
From now until the thinning ends of September,
I weed in mornings, water in evenings, mind
drifting up to afternoons—through the pane of blue
peppered with clouds & shot through with glints
of gold, a glaze of heat on blade & leaf & bloom
& brow—up to stellar nurseries,
where novas brighten into being,
forget-me-nots bursting,
then bending over
bog with faces
of sky.
I am learning to love myself
In the arms of trees
I need to talk
doesn’t need
to sound like
I need to talk
It can still be an invitation-
I’d like the chance
to sit and talk with you-
necessary, but without the sharpness
A text, hours in advance
gives time to prepare
for quality conversation
because blindsides aren’t always fair
With a way out-
could be today or tomorrow-
gives you all the time you need
to run if you so choose
Your acceptance sets the stage
A storm makes landfall
and two adults engage
in a peaceful conflict of hearts
The problem is presented
understanding is offered
reasons are challenged
then bitter pills are swallowed
But how much better for us
to turn devastation
into a minor downpour
so friendship can thrive
The next days may be tricky
The sting may never linger long
but we will see each other again
so all that’s left now to say
is thank you
What is a tanka
glorified
But a haiku
Some summer cock
tail
h n
Syllables stirred not s a e
k
Iced spirits s w e e t on the tongue
sadness builds in my heart as the realization hits:
the sun will sink a bit faster than yesterday and
the light will dim quicker along the horizon
how lucky to witness the full illumination
to understand the sorrow that accompanies its slow retreat
(6/20/2024, the moment of the solstice)
4:35
Near the end,
past four Great Mullein plants
their seven foot erections
bowing down in the heat,
I walk to the deep shade
behind the hemp pond
to rest in the hammock
and swing slowly between
locust and maple,
like a slow leak
the sky trickles out
and falls into my hollow nap.
I will not look at my watch,
but wait and wait,
it will happen everywhere
at once for everyone and
everything on earth,
this common moment
this pull of the thread
when we’re one
4:51
I feel it:
the end
the beginning, that now
and again now, and now, and now
tilts the earth back,
this biannual action
ordinary as a grasshopper.
Summer can race on with its
milkweed
butterfly bush
blue chicory
5:07
I consider that this is the season
I will be seventy-six
and get up from the hammock
to exit my cool retreat. Down the hill
along the road, I hear
the mailman at the box.
The page is turned.
