Posts for 2025 (page 11)

Far too long I’ve spent
filling two spaces
for which only one is present.

A question remains unanswered
until I stand from my chair at teatime
to sit in the one across—
smiling and laughing at my own quip,
offering myself another pastry.

Far too long I’ve been trapped
in my own safe fantasy.
I’m not as whimsical
as I think I am
when I actually have a conversation
with another person
outside of that bubble.

Most of the time,
they’re outside looking in.
If not,
I never get a glimpse
of where they entered from.

I don’t do—
and haven’t done—
very much,
outside of staring blankly at myself
in the mirror for hours,
taking a stroll in the same loop since 2020
in an antisocial neighborhood,
taking the same nightly bath
I’ve long indulged in,
no matter how red my skin becomes
from the heat.

The newest thing I’ve picked up on
is shoving vibrant words together
and making them mean something.

I’m free to leave this loop
whenever I please,
only—
I haven’t yet found the exit door
where the sky
meets the water.

Walking with my daughter,
I found the paper
grounded in the gutter:

Study: Bagels linked
to increased risk
of lung cancer

Walking on, looking back
I watch the wind whip
the rag down the alley.

My daughter, all of 7, had a
bagel for lunch. Still, she
scampered up the avenue.

Dead ahead, plum trees,
exploding in purple, rustled
restlessly like the paper,

Never looking back, she
separated. Now, I would
worry about bagels, too.

I never cut my nails on a Sunday.
It’s country as fuck bad luck.
I don’t know where the superstition started,
all I know is it got handed on down to me.
And I took it up like Granny gospel.
In defiance of the way they rob our magic
and try to replace it with shiny truckS
that won’t even haul a load of logs.
We need the psalms and the songs
of the Papaws and the Mamaws
who loved the land and not the state.
The Granny gospel.
Like how you put a pot of coffee on
when your left palm gets to itchin’
because you know somebody’s coming.
Like how you make sure
there’s a pone of cornbread
and a pot of beans already on the stove
to fill all the hungry bellies.
The Granny gospel says
plug your jugs with red bandanas boys,
the book of Mother Jones
the holy fire of moonshine molotovs.
My palm is itching something awful
and revolution’s never all that far
from gravel roads ’round here.  

My trio of grandsons,
Six eyes, shades of blue, hazel and grey
Three bodies-
One dark-haired, thin, long limbed,
One muscular, tall, light haired
One tiny, fair, with translucent skin
Constant noiseFootfalls, slow and fast,
Stomps, leaps, jumps, light and heavy
Calls for paper and markers, bee keeper items cut from cardboard,
Paper and pencil to solve ciphers in mystery books,
Games of Spiderman Uno and Junior Scrabble,
Voices creating
Fantasy, wizards, potions, spells, complex rules, protective shields,
Ever-present battle plans and weaponry-
Storm trooper guns, nerf guns, light sabers (red, blue and green)
Ninja stars, swords, costumes
Spotify playing the Darth Vader playlist and Kung Fu Fighting on repeat
Singing, dancing, swinging, punching (fake and real)
Stuffies (dogs, eagles, owls) in the mix
Building with Legos and Magna Tiles
Reading books

I will miss it all,
Especially this trio.

daily bed-making

feels like sculpting sand castles

just to kick them down

You’ve come to help? Oh, good. My courage has grown weary
and I was needing a new action plan. I am thankful for whoever can be here.
Where do we start, you ask?
How about dragging these once-beautiful wool rugs out to the burn pile?
Careful lifting them. They’re full of water and are doggone heavy.
And do you see those soggy boxes of keepsakes? They need to be hauled out, too.
Plus that little chest-of-drawers that’s turned over and laying by the door,
And the books on these bottom shelves must go. The sooner the better.
Also these photo albums sitting on the floor;
they’re all stuck together and gone; I couldn’t pry them apart.
Floods do so much damage!  I’m still trying not to pout.
Oh yeah, and I had stacks of lumber in the garage,
but they turned over and got warped, so they need to be burned, too.
But I am really grateful to be safe, along with my dog and chickens.

as far as she knew none of it was real

neither the birdsong nor the calls for unity

neither the sky nor the rage burrowed in her neck

neither the hope she risked nor the ashes of her dreams-

the ones she hid underneath her tongue

I’ve stumbled upon what appears to be
an absolute crux of everything 
imaginable in this universe
pertaining to human relationships
and to my lifelong struggle
with feeling that I am not welcome or embraced
in a strait-laced-posing as avant garde art scene
or a so called “open minded” clique of erudite lackeys
who consistently praise and uplift on the basis
of mass conformity and ass kissing, shoe licking
shoe horned dogma, “love-thy-neighbor-
but-not-the-brown-or-poor-from-the-other-side-of-town” Christians
Be thy rebellious, but only in ways that are not atypical or unrecognizable 
crowds of moon worshipping TikTok new age hipsters
walking a camel line to the cool side of the desert
going on publicized breaks from their incessant consumption
of Bacchus’s reticent, sleep-walking, over saturated pleasure
to tally their latest rare bird sightings

And that is that the human has a right
to believe what they want
and if they believe well,
they shant be wrong
but to choose to believe different,
to make thy own way
is the hardest indeed
For Nothing Is More Incomprehensible,
Threatening, Horrifying and Infuriating 
As being unsanctioned.

I’m really not remembering 
Those things I wish to bury

I keep them hidden quite away
From lighter ordinary

Things and purposely forget
The combination to the lock

So I won’t have to have to face those things
I’d rather have forgot

It truly is convenient
And I’m doing oh so well

Just thinking of the things I want 
To think about and tell

So little artist child I beg you
Not to dig too deep 

It surely is much better
Just to let forgotten sleep