haiku: nina simone’s cover

i can’t listen to
her “here comes the sun” right now.
it’s winter in me.

I know how right you are, you nightmare,

The sun was dimmer this time of year.
We sat on the floor of your crystal palace,
brown curls spilling down like the gnarled tree your sister painted.
There was no concrete way to express our grief,
for two people who have lost little but enough,
just the crying and the silence and the emptiness that followed.

Today is my sister’s birthday
Yesterday was my other sister’s birthday

One born before midnight
The other born after

My sisters are unique and special

Identical
Twins
With
Their
Own
Birthdays  

They called to inform us that your ashes are ready for pickup–
how strange it is to think you could possibly fit into such a tiny box,
all that love,
   all that life,
        all of you.

But there you are

and here I am

      s
         C

         a
               t
      T
                e
         r
                      E
                                  d

Holding you
contained before my eyes
while your spirit envelopes every waking moment I continue living.

letter sealed by wax

Although I told her personal things
I know mermaids are not real

But see, the trees keep growing
The talking head on T.V. gives his opinion

Each morning slightly different
Now folded into paper like a swan

I decided that I’m not that crazy
Is anyone listening?

Again the light shines on the wall
There are two baby rabbits living under the shed

The past visits like a stray cat
Stirred by my waking

A reluctant day beginning
Celebrated or maybe mourned

The clanging of machinery, the water rising
Anything goes

If you live close to the source
and a green gown made of hope

drown in

                   the power
             of      a
            field,
      a                  creek.

                            Latch
to               want,
        a
bird,         blue

      blur,

                   hovering

        solitude.

* An erasure of Ada Limón’s poem “Drowning Creek” in her collection, The Hurting Kind

Distilled delicasy diluted
Cubes clinking against crystal
Never a solution
to the ills life brings
Just something to help you
no longer care

More than just a photogenic face,
and you will need to work to know her
after you first earn her trust, patiently,
waiting for her to feel comfortable,
to want to spend more time with you
then safe enough to speak with you.

More than a woman, though that
will never be unimportant to her,
and should always matter to you,
she is a person, carrying her past
while being reshaped by now
and pondering future secrets.

This moment in candlelight,
yesterday at the beach,
tomorrow at the green grocers,
flashing eternities in her arms:
Learn what she feels of them.
Be worthy of their repetition.

(after the 1943 photograph by Olive Cotton)