the skin beside my nails is blanching
and peeling up, away
from my twitching fingers. reaching
for some other life
in the sun, some vacation from sizzling
summer blood, the
starving pain of doing nothing for days
on end, unending
afternoons in a paralyzed yellow daze.

what do you have to be stressed about,
she asks. nothing,
i reply. doing nothing is what i have to be
stressed about, cicadas
in the back of my mind getting louder
and louder, screaming
TAKE HOLD! TAKE ACTION! MOVE!
my eyes won’t unstick
from an unspecial point on the wall.
i tear my skin slowly
and it hardens into strawberry flesh,
tender and nervous.

Cherry tree is dead. 
See saw down from found to ground;
Woodpeckers unbound. 

A wind ran right over me and climbed through a window,
says Rock. No more windows for me. I’m retired.
In peacetime, I can be someone’s pet.  

They brushed their battle plans off me, says Paper,
and wrote a treaty on that clean slate.
Fold me into an airplane. I feel so free.  

From now on, I will cut only ribbons,
says Scissors. The war, unlike me,
never did have a point.
 

They 
Called 
Her
“Crazy”.

 She 
Split 
Her 
Daddy’s 
18 by 18 
Protrait
Straigth 
Down
The 
Middle
With 
One 
Hard 
Whack 
Of 
The 
Switch 
Blade 
Ax

Like
A lumberjack falling a tree…

Then, stared at some distant point. 

I know a person who lost everything he once loved

His family, his love, his name, his dreams

And yet, he still bears the weight of it all with a bright smile

A knowing smile

I also know a woman who has lost nothing of the sort

And she spits on him, passing judgement as if she holds the key to life’s secrets

Her venomous words sizzle in my stomach, burning my heart like acid

How can it be true?

How can she be righteous and he be condemned?

How can I know nothing and they know God’s will?

My community is built on love, respect

Hers? On shifting sand

My mother’s bitterness will be her damnation

Dear god,
peace to
the birds
singing in
the mornin-
g where
the
dew
on the
grass
sways.
Amen

With an undercurrent whiff of cowshit,
the milking house smelled like sweet grass
and bleach–Memaw, my earliest memories 
are of you at work. The milk swirling beige
in a cistern–cow’s tongues leech like rope.  

In one man’s house, I remember turning
a rainstick in my hands, over and over. 
I remember the woman who flooded night
with all the searchlights–her ghosts rancled. 

Those were the second years of caregiving: us kids,
old folks, my sick papaw, your aunt and mom. 
I wish I could afford you the care you gave.

Maybe now, we both have our own ghosts
in our heads–different ghosts as distance
has moved us from each other.

But in the letterbox of my heart, a note etched
in bologna scraps and red pantsuit,
in bluegrass dancing and holy rolling,
in coffee creamer and in the wind-on-chime
under the spread of trees–in the farm
a half forgotten memory, a rue
of green around us, it spells out “G–.”

Katydid            
this,     
         
Katy-           
did that—
             
All I hear            
about              

is            
Katydid.

to do’s
all good I get to
but it’s Saturday I’m
taking a day off.
If I were to end today
for good
there would no longer either be
this list 🙂

I was in a dark forest hiding behind a tree

as I breathed so frantically, I wondered if you would ever stop chasing me

it was cold and so foggy I could barely see

while the wind began carrying on with an eerie tune of whistling

you knew I had no idea and was amused at the way I was listening

I sensed you could feel the vibrations of my shivering and I realized I was coming closer instead of distancing