My jeans are
too hot.
My shoes are
too tight.
My right sock
is bunched up.
I have to keep
adjusting my shirt.
My glasses
need to be cleaned.
My beard
is uneven.
My hair
sticks out in annoying spots.
My fingernails
and toenails
need clippin’.
I am happy.
I am healthy.
I want for nothing.
I need to stop complaining.
Most wheat pennies aren’t worth much money,
but the ones I still find I keep in my jewelry box.
They were a currency between my dad and me.
We’d share how we found them on sidewalks
or in change, the pleasure of unexpected treasure.
He gave me boxes of coins before he died.
At the funeral, I said to others, I’m happy for him,
because grieving I forgot how to talk. That’s not him,
I said to my sister by his casket. He’s with his friends,
she replied. How could I disagree?
I can’t distinguish between wheat pennies and grace,
yet I know the currency of trust,
the delight of undeserved reward.
As a woman in this world
As a white woman in this world
As a white woman in this world who is a mother
NOW
As a white woman in the United States
As a white woman in the United States who is educated
As a white woman in the United States who is an educated mother
All I can think about are the challenges that I have had to overcome to get here.
WHO AM I TO BE SO LUCKY TO HAVE SURVIVED WHEN OTHERS DID NOT COMING FROM WHERE I DID?
THEN
I think about the other women
Who like me, did not make it out
So many look at me and say that it’s because I was privileged
Maybe they are right in some fashion
BUT I HAVE NOT FORGOTTEN THEIR FACES WHEN I WAS IN MY TRENCHES
WE were all there together clawing through the mud and blood
WE were all there crying through the night, holding each other through our silent prayers
ALL OUR PRAYERS ECHOED THE SAME!
It was the African women who braided my hair when I couldn’t wash it
They braided in earthly mothers prayers for safety like my Aunt Nita used to do when I was little
It was the Latino women who fed me when I was too weak to hold a spoon
They stirred and folded in their great abuelas love into the recipes to strengthen my spine and give me back my voice, just like my mamaw would for us grandbabies
It was the Asian women who hid me in the back of the restaurant when my daughter and I had nowhere to shelter from the rain and gave us fortune cookies to remind us not to lose hope in a time of crisis just like my papaw would have done
THEN
We were all separated by culture, customs and generations of heritage
No chromosomes were ever shared but traumatic conditions connected us all the same
Sometimes no language was ever shared, spoken or ever understood
Just the universal affirmation of respect and love, bonding women together in a time where no words are needed.
I have not forgotten their faces when I was in my trenches.
Somewhere,
I am laughing right now.
Not eventually.
Not after I learn a lesson.
Not once the character arc resolves.
There is
a person with whom
an unreasonable amount of fun
is happening.
The evidence feels overwhelming.
I keep encountering things
to share with someone.
A joke.
A strange headline.
A softball game
that becomes a story
before it’s over.
And yet,
I am here.
Lying in bed next to my dog
writing poems about alternate timelines.
Quantum physicists propose
many worlds.
A branching universe
containing every possible outcome.
Which means there is likely
another version of me
currently sitting on
top of a piano
kissing,
or walking through a park
or getting ice cream
with the person
I keep reaching for
in the middle of the night.
I am happy for her.
But I would also like
to know where the hidden hatch is.
I have been remarkably patient
with this timeline.
Completed the assigned grief.
Demonstrated growth.
Learned the lessons.
Meanwhile,
somewhere in the multiverse,
two idiots are laughing so hard
they miss a train.
They stay for one more drink.
They accidentally create
a favorite memory.
I would like access
to that branch.
Or at minimum,
an update.
I continue collecting stories
for someone
who has not shown up yet.
This feels less like hope
and more like
being a puppy
who doesn’t understand
when her person
is coming home.
a few bad days at work leaves one despirited
so a coworker texts a meme to make him smile
another gives a wide berth
the boss wonders if he made a mistake
he did but he’s still learning
a man falls and breaks his arm
a buddy brings him food
another helps him get dressed
yet another visits
just to keep him company
a death happens
family and friends mourn
outer circles sympathize
and someone skips across a news article
all five stages of grief in full spectrum
Did you know
far up in the sky, the sun
wobbles
in the gravities
of all the planets?
one who cannot be left alone
begs the presence of another
who then passes on some evening fun
their absence is felt by many
two guys crushing on the same girl
but she clearly likes one more
so the second never makes a move
neither does the first
it’s summer and it’s chilly from the day’s
temperature-debasing downpour
i go inside to get a jacket and wonder
where is that rain at now?
When the moon says hello,
She’s confessing her deepest thoughts.
Spilling realizations, truths, and wisdom into the stars,
Painting her life before them,
Stroking between the transitions of life,
Dragging the brush with colors to be seen,
Just
for the hope
that she’s understood by daylight.
WE LET
The mountains never promised ease,
nor fields of gold or gentle breeze;
they gave us stone and stubborn clay,
and taught us how to find a way.
The creeks would rise with angry rain,
then leave behind their marks of pain.
The hills would slide, the rivers roar,
yet still we’d mend each broken door.
Our fathers bent beneath the ground,
where daylight’s song could not be found.
With blackened hands and aching bone,
they carved out wealth they’d never own.
Our mothers stitched by lantern’s glow,
made little stretch and children grow.
They turned one loaf to feed us all,
and stood the tallest when we’d fall.
The whistle cried before the dawn,
while frost still dressed the fields and lawn.
The lunch pail swung with quiet grace,
as hope was written on each face.
The young would leave with dreams packed light,
chasing distant city lights.
Some found fortune, some found pain,
some longed for home and came again.
The empty schools, the weathered stores,
the silence of forgotten doors—
each tells a tale the wind still knows
of lives that bloomed where little grows.
We’ve buried kin beneath old pines,
marked only by the passing times.
Their stories live in creek and tree,
in every ridge and memory.
Still Sunday hymns climb mountain air,
a faithful answer to despair.
Though roofs may leak and pockets thin,
the richest wealth has dwelled within.
For hardship is a faithful guest
who seldom grants a night of rest.
Yet grit is born where trials stay,
and hope still finds another day.
The world may pass these hills on by,
not seeing what beneath them lies;
but every scar upon this land
was shaped by an enduring hand.
So let them measure worth by gold,
by towers high and fortunes told.
We’ll count our riches differently—
in family, faith, and memory.
For though the mountains bear our tears,
they’ve also held us through the years.
And when our names are lost to time,
they’ll echo softly through the pines.
As long as ridges kiss the sky,
and whip-poor-wills still sing nearby,
the hearts that hardship could not bend
will call these mountains home… til end.
