American Sentence XLVI
He smiles like church men do when wading sinners to river baptisms.
Give me a moment,
it will come back to me,
names pressed into my life,
notes embossed
on sheet music.
I heard our heartbeats,
fast lub – dub over
slow steady maternal sounds.
It’s like breathing in deep
without exhaling,
without dropping a beat,
silence between notes,
silence that is melody,
one moment, breathing,
the next moment, still.
I cannot talk about that day,
I never could
say even a word.
No goodbyes,
only an X-ray cocoon,
a Monarch Butterfly,
wings folded
between cushions
of pink endometrial tissue.
It will come back,
a dream of
blond curls that bounce,
blue eyes like my mother’s,
and the sky,
full of wings,
lifting and drifting,
like the melody
before the stillness.
Today’s our Anniversary
Happy Anniversary to us
34 years ago
I pledged my love
Forever
To the man who
Looked into
My soul
And
Saw his Soulmate
Before that day
We each carried love
But there was a missing piece
When our souls connected
It sparked a new heartbeat
Two hearts
Forged
One Heart
Once, as a teenager, I called
my parents from the dungeon
of a hospital’s laundry room,
with its bank of phone booths,
its humid heat, its rattling tumble
of dryers, to say their son was dead.
In the instant of trying to tell Mom
and hearing Dad in the background
I could not imagine the words to use,
could not explain the cold-hearted doctor
who evicted me from my brother’s room,
or my sister-in-law’s hugs or the nurse
who pulled my arm then put quarters in my palm
or the woman from housekeeping who
slotted the coins and asked for our number,
our number instilled in me from infancy,
the only one we ever had: 442 – 0406.
She dialed. I tried to remember why.
When all my best poems come from pain,
Sunrise, Sunset
Lying in bed, burning
with the night’s heat
shared unexpectedly,
the way the sun burns
through an early fog
that hides the way ahead.
A different bed, shivering
with the day’s betrayal,
equally unexpected,
the way the air goes cold
as the sun reveals a new way
between horizon and storm.
(after an undated and untitled image by Roman Rivera, seen at https://www.facebook.com/share/jvRhzGtfuZLF6Frn/?mibextid=WC7FNe)
a sincere smile
polite greetings
chaste touch
consoling eye contact
kind words
gentle response
consistent caring
rational support
above all,
faith in God
With a sweet smile
Without a hint of guile
In a languid hush
With a hint of a blush
Shout it out
Like a roustabout
Sing it sweet
Like a robin’s tweet
Say it with a tear
But never with a sneer
Say it now
And now
And now
And even now
Say it before you’re filled with dread
Because the person you’d say it to Is already dead
The blue hydrangea
heavy in weight
dripped down the incline,
old cobblestone steps now moss covered,
forgotten by years of neglect and storm.
Planted years before by loving hands
delicately covering its roots in between
vespers and rest.
No one remembered when the blue bush
took hold of that corner of the garden,
pillowy drape wild in charm.
It grew not far from a rusty gate now loosely
leaning from rotted cedar posts.
The heaviness of the blooms rushed past
the gate, a surging river, a tired memory
trying to gather the details of her life.
The blueness of the flowers deep in thought
wrapped around her, a long lost lover.
The scent spilled floral magic from
the hands of the aged sacristan.
