Wednesday, November 25, 2015

Day 25. November PAD - Echoes (Echoes of a time)





Echoes of a time
maaaaama-maaama-maaaamamaaaaaa?
shush, hush, shush, hush, whispers to myself in the dark
a dog barks – a big dog running in the field coming home
the yowl of that Siamese cat – petite and perfect and a killer
maaaaama-maaama-mama?-
chirps in the sunsetting air swooping arcs of bats lovely in distance
the sea slapping against the shore outside the open window
that guttural growling groan – ecstasy disguised as pain
the silly pop of unsunctioning slick skin from slick skin
rain battering the tin roof billions of golf balls banging and then silence
the run of fresh water pinging on the downspout pouring into the cistern
maaaaama-maaama-mamaaaaa?
little lips smacking so shockingly loud against my breast
whop-whop-whop wood bladed ceiling fan– creaking ancient a/c
that certain sigh slipping one time too many at the wrong time
the dog barks running home, the cat is out, shush, hush, groans follow
chirps, sea slaps, rain bangs, baby stirs on fresh sheets, rain falls,
fan turns and turns, sigh, sigh, sighs floating to sea –
rooster crows clear and pure from somewhere near – and then…
Out of nowhere it comes.
MamaMamaMama
Yes. Yes. Yes.
Oh. Yes.

Monday, November 23, 2015

Day 23. November PAD - Waiting for...



Waiting For Death 
I suppose it comes of being a tiny
girl taking daddy’s pulse-pressing
a small ear to his broad chest and
repeating the sounds of his heart
to him bump, bump, bum-bump,
bum-bump-bump. I suppose it
comes of a certain blurry sense
of certitude in ephemerality born
in first breath – swirling through-
out first years – as I sat with him
listening to music pounding so
loud that the walls shook and
he cried with passion and some-
thing unnamable – I suppose –
it was then I noticed Death had
slipped in and sat on the couch
walked the shore-line and every-
where with us – so close that I
could almost see an arm draped
above daddy’s young shoulders –
I suppose it comes from Death as
just another member of the family
uninvited but constantly there be-
cause He was, after-all at home –
I suppose even though it took so
many years for him to reach out
his hand and clasp my father’s –
there was always the waiting – not
in fear but in inexorable anticipation
I suppose – it sounds odd to some
but that’s just the way families are.
sometimes.

Sunday, November 22, 2015

Fall






Fall

Meet me in the tide - pass the past
pass where the light flickers soft-tames
the lash of leaden night – meet me there
hidden in the abyss of my moonlit lust – my flesh
and yours one wet in the mist -our fall my
holy, hidden, secret - forever drifting




Sunday, November 15, 2015

Day 15. November PAD - ritual




Ritually Retired
She yearns for the yawns
of a little one – bath-time
splashes and sugar kisses
story-time and bed snuggles
tucking in and lights off
leaving the door open just
so – she yearns for the yawn
of time to shut its mouth and
hiccup her back to bedtime
now melted into memory –


Je Suis Paris








Je Suis Paris



I have never been to Paris
never felt cobbled streets
beneath my feet – never 
seen the Eiffel tower bright
or flowers tumbling from
wooden boxes in pasteled
painted buildings – I have 
never stood in a crowd 
held in the lilting lyricism of 
French or had a croissant
melt buttered between my
lips but the light – the light
of Paris burns, shines and 
glows within me – I too am 
Paris now and always one 
in solidarity and sensibility -
steadfast siblings forever ...




Friday, November 13, 2015

Day 13 - November PAD - Memory (in the garden)




the garden
in this garden of blossoms crowded
in profusion–grandmother’s velvet
carpet dance – an infant impossibly
soft suckling madly at my breast as
I sit in the glow of sunset and watch
the swallows gently swoop in a post-
card tropical sky – a father flings his
raven hair from his eye squinting at
a smear of cobalt on his canvas and
turns to wink – the last nuzzle from
a grand beast her eye light dimming
disappeared – a tiny boy salutes his
father’s passing coffin – a first kiss
different from all others –a mother's
long legs curled on couch watching
the news explode- passing chocolates
in the silent seriousness- seeing actions'
approach -her foot touches mine- bare
foot on grand-father’s black shine-shoes
hanging on this father-of-only-boy’s
belt as he turns me gently as though
I too am made of the same crystal
shining on all the lemon oiled tables –
family tables – loaded and empty –
laughter and food passed from hand
to hand – faces melting one generation
to another –reconfiguring regenerating
pushed blossoms in the garden-under
each another – diving into aquamarine
sea sun strong on shoulders taut skin
breaking surface with a smiling gasp–
blue skied towers tumble crumbling
into smoke steaming in suddenly sur-
real streets –sea swarming from shore
sweeping all as tinder in her path –two
saplings supported with sticks in earth-
two thick gnarled trunks – tiny chestnut
blossoms float over two nuns walking
through a sunlit arch of dappling trees –
hands folded in crisp habits – ebon on
pure white heads bent to each other –
a cantor swirls a silver threaded tallis
mystic as a magician’s cape and sparkling
sings under the painted ceiling of celestial
sites – sighs- sweet – tiny ball of coal fluff
at the door – kindergarten ordered into
three Stop-Look-Listen chimes in a new
world – falling into thousands of storied
tears, fears, fortitude, learning, love, loss,
laughing out loud on a train in a tunnel lost
in pages, my name on a spine – back in a brace –
dancing in the sand – on hardwood floors snow
falling outside -blossoms bursting in pushed profusion –
only one wispy worrisome almost invisible trace of cloud
on a distant horizon of the gathering someday –
when all will wither – dry as autumn leaves crackle
between page –and this survivorship of self will fly
from the folds – ancient flowers turned powder shall
lift and blow away – in an inevitable gust of innocent
indifferent wind – floating over some other’s garden
sparkling, feeding perhaps a bud or two in another’s
garden crowded with blossoms pushing profusion –



Thursday, November 12, 2015

Day 10 - November PAD - Technology/Anti-technology (3 for two-for-Tuesday)



       Techie Trek

         We’re marching off for good
         We’re marching off for glory
         We’re sitting at our screens
         We’re tapping out our story
         No longer feel the sun – no
         need to hear the rain – all
         the world is streaming live
         our flesh-blood tech’s gain
         Hard to leave the access of
         myriad manic possibility
         wrenching to return to a
         tactile linear reality
         so watch the toddler
         in the tide, convene
         with covens of mystic
         friends you now hold
         dear – nothing to be
         lost – nothing here to
         fear – for
         We’re marching off for good
         We’re marching off for glory
         We’re sitting here in shing glare
         We’re screening our life story –


~
                        
an oxymoron
the ubiquitous touchscreen
feeling not a thing

~


         she fashioned a life to
         live in quiet walking in
         her head by the sea in
         glorious lush languid sigh-
         lence – drinking coffee iced
         or steamed as care and cli-
         mate suggested – and so it
         was – though books shone
         through screen light and
         binging watching television
         a new magnetic attraction –
         her words flowed not in liquid
         ink but on bright screens at
         fingertips always clean – she
         sat inhaling ions – under the
         glare and when she inter-
         acted it was all screened
         brightly until her eyes seared
         and stripped burned – until her
         fingers trembled with tremor
         as the all embracing light
         turned magnetically malevo-
         lent and she reached for actual
         aluminum to fashion herself a
         hat to protect herself from the
         terror of too much, too bright,
         too near, too bloodless, scent-
         less ephemerality reality –
         slipping through cracks
         of sunless light
         and in the still
         she sits alone
         tin hat on head
         waiting for life
         to reboot –


Day 12 - November PAD - After (blank)



After the thump 
after that thump of earth hits
the wood and the once worthy
work and wonder of it all left for
others – you shall find me – in the
whisper of the wind, in the rustle
of filigreed light playing shadow games
on your baby’s toes as he grasps in de-
light reaching for all he can still,  with new
eyes see clearly - tickled into gales of giggles
in a clear new day – as you pause and wonder –
shake off a passing chill and smile at the innocence
of infants grasping delighted handfuls of sweet breezes
at what for a time you will only see as nothingness – until
After.



Monday, November 9, 2015

Day 9. November PAD - Mistake




Chewed
she was an earnest child
wide eyed and determined
standing on line waiting
for teacher to look at her
paper and put a red A on
top – she prayed for this
standing on line this first
grade tumbled haired
earnest child chewing
her pink pencil eraser
heart pounding at all
the torn shame-spots
where with flame-faced
fury she'd scrubbed each
mis-take

Saturday, November 7, 2015

Day 6. November PAD - We're being watched


We’re being watched

We're 
being watched
from toppled tower top
to crematorium ash
from toddler in the tide
to butterfly wings lifting
less - we’re being watched
as ice caps cap-polar bears roar
in melted muddied-bloodied
water- tsunamis racing over
sunbathers, bombs blasting 
chests of children waiting
for virginal reward in a here-
after seen more clearly than
any present possibility- we’re
being watched as too many
gobble goods in focused greed
clutching frantic as any un-
schooled toddler in a toy shop –
more as they slide side by side
impoverished - we’re being
watched - as even one hand 
stretches for another to grasp -
to lift –to support -to comfort
this world –spun out of sense and
sanity slipping -we’re being watched
as planes burst in the sky and flesh falls
in fields as scraps for survivors to
scrape home - we’re being watched –
as we turn away
we are being
watched
by sight-
seeing
each
and
all