Dancing with the Oak trees,
the wind waves me over to join
in the gala, showing off June’s
green gown as the sun-shadowed
leaves flutter and fawn.
Queen Anne nods her lacy head
and bows over wild carrot roots.
Above, the sky’s light smiles
down with warm pride as the
clouds circle in the promonade.
Papaw’s hands were mountain-made,
Carved by coal and spade and blade.
Blackened deep where daylight failed,
In tunnels where brave hearts prevailed.
Every wrinkle held a seam,
Every scar recalled a dream
Of bringing supper to the stove,
Of earning every ounce of love.
His knuckles wore the color night,
Though his spirit carried light.
Coal dust settled in each line
Like scripture etched beneath the mine.
Those hands could split a hickory round,
Set fence posts firm in rocky ground.
Patch a roof before the rain,
Or soothe a child through fear and pain.
I’ve watched them cradle Grandma’s face
With roughness softened into grace.
The same hands that wrestled stone
Never let her stand alone.
When Sunday came, he’d scrub them clean,
Though black still lingered in between.
Soap could wash the dust away,
But not the years they’d given away.
Now the mines have all grown still,
Their echoes sleeping in the hill.
Yet when the evening shadows stand,
I still remember Papaw’s hands.
For mountains rise, and rivers bend,
And every road must find its end.
But the strongest thing this world has known
Was never carved of steel or stone.
It was a pair of weathered hands,
That built a life on borrowed lands.
Hands that dug through earth so deep
So generations yet could sleep.
If Heaven keeps what time demands,
Then angels know my Papaw’s hands.
Still stained with coal, still strong, still true—
The hands that built the world I knew.
I place a foot upon a rung
I pull myself up one more step
Looking down I have come so far
Rising up like the lonely star
Shedding yesterday in my wake
To Heaven I make weary climb
Each step and pull a weighted thing
Each step up a good deed I sing
Though not easy to be divine
I’m almost there, I hear the call
Trumpets playing through golden hall
Passing final rung, standing tall
Then I begin to
Fall
Fall
Fall
From
Grace
Into
the
clouds
below
Ladder
rungs
flying
past
in
blur
Cruel
Winds
They
Whip
Me
To
And
Fro
Then I land upon
Rock bottom
Everything here so very still
Everything here is so quiet
Allowed time to reflect on life
Countless missteps during the climb
Wasn’t perfect I never was
Yet here I am at start again
Two choices, then, I have to me
Stay and wallow in self-pity
Or make that dreaded climb again
I cannot promise anything
But I can try to right the wrongs
Putting others before myself
Most important: I’ll be myself
A weary grip upon a rung
I pull myself up one more step
Looking back I cannot forget
No matter how far we have come
In life we climb
In life we fall
I am a turtle on a rock
A cat in a box
I am in sleep mode
waiting for a system update
My pens will not pirouette
I will avoid eye contact
with the list on the fridge
The weeds in the flower bed
will get a reprieve
This corner of the couch
has invisible straps
My spirit surrenders to a languid state
I can reach the remote
my bag of chips
I will plea to loved ones
to refill my glass
I knocked on his door, he never fails to answer. Losing hope by the second I turned around, his mustang pulling in. I knocked on his door while he was up on the hill, as he says, whispering a soliloquy of my name, my spirit and my safety. Oh what divine mercy. If there’s a god he gave me the best person. I was in my early twenties on his porch,
crying on my dad like I was a little girl again, for a second I was home again.
I prayed to a god I don’t believe in for a sign that everything was going to be alright.
I stepped outside and he was there on the porch, I sat beside him in the midsummer heat, the evening sun setting behind the thick green trees.
We both gazed into the field and saw a doe chasing a coyote.
neither of us said anything for a moment.
He had never seen anything like it, he said, in living here for 30 years. My awareness sharpened, the warmth in my heart started to pulsate, suddenly I was drowning in light. My sign was right there in front of my eyes.
God was a goddess this entire time.
We all know what it means to miss the boat,
to find ourselves a fish out of water.
So over our heads, we have to sink or swim.
If we can’t reverse the tide the only way out
is to bite the bullet and swim against it.
Break a leg, they say so I try to get my act together,
to find a way to hang in there. No use getting bent
out of shape and making things worse. It could
get out of hand if all hells breaks loose.
Let’s go back to the drawing board.
It isn’t rocket science when we wrap our heads
around how to bite the bullet and get the train
back on track so we don’t bark up the wrong tree.
If we miss the boat, we’ll find ourselves in a real
pickle. I swear, that will be the last straw.
What can we do but live and learn? Just
remember to look before you leap. You
know you can’t have your cake and eat it too.
Don’t go throwing caution to the wind. Get
over it and remember, no pain, no gain.
There is no best of both worlds, unless your
guess is better than mine. No crying over spilt
milk when you bite off more than you can chew.
Cutting corners is no way to navigate a perfect storm
even when getting something out of your system.
I’ll cut you some slack if you get your act together and
stop adding insult to injury. Change your attitude.
Don’t you have bigger fish to fry? Every cloud
has a silver lining. It’s a blessing in disguise.
Good things come to those who wait.
Actions speak louder than words. Do you get the
picture? That picture is worth a thousand words.
We can all live and learn at least once in a blue moon.
After all, time flies when we’re having fun.
Let’s say that again.
Once I was a rucksack wanderer, hitching on the road like my “Beat” heroes.
In Kerouac’s “The Dharma Bums,” Japhy Rider (Gary Snyder) says, “…I see a vision of a great rucksack revolution, thousands or even millions of rucksack wanderers…”
I read the words and followed.
Owning nothing but a rucksack, hiking shoes, jeans, a blue work shirt, and a pup tent; I was 27, escaped from teaching high school English in Iowa and ready to live.
So we meandered up the East coast, into Canada, hitching rides, sleeping under bridges, in packing crates, on sand dunes, in the woods; sailing to islands on ferry boats; relying on the good will of strangers, which never failed.
Decades later, a therapist told me I must have had a death wish, putting myelf in danger like that. Danger? Never thought about it. I was busy being a rucksack wanderer. Adventure was my middle name.
late again
in trouble for reading
Ferlinghetti
all night with another
rogue poet
i used to dream we lived in a house of
sorrow i searched night after night in room after
room grown smaller and smaller to find your spring birdsong
voice and your summer blue eyes
i was so careful with our sorrow i carried
it cradled it crawling through our shrinking twisting
house on my belly squeezing through broken doors into secret halls
collapsing under the weight of loss
on my last night in this house of dreams still on
my belly still all alone i found a door in the dark i stood
i stepped into it stumbled through onto a staircase spiraling away from the
red autumn day when i survived you
on my feet i climbed up and out of this house to a place
of new promise where those moonless black nights are become
shining blue skies on clear winter mornings with bright window glass warming me
but i still love you and still want our years
