Monday, April 8, 2013

Poetry Month Continued....





Poetry Day 5;

Sisters at the Beach

We sit at the edge of the surf
Sand scratching our swimsuits and
Waves crashing across half buried legs

Summer is unfolding slowly
Bent paperbacks rest on faded beach towels
The boombox plays your favorite mix tape
We are set with Bums bummer tshirts
Flipflops and a cooler with ice tea and
Pimento cheese sandwiches

Gulls beg at shrimp boats and beachcombers
Search for shell sized treasure
We are soaking in ours.

You go lay out and I lay flat in the surf
Covered in sea, salt, sunshine...
Bathed in water and wonder.


Poetry Day 6: 
Falling Inwards

There behind the asphalt window

Sitting kind and frail - she picks the last morsel between her teeth and swallows

Sandwiched between silence and some sense of forgotten
her pale rouged cheeks fall inwards like so many things

A stray hand clutches the edge of a white afghan
the other flutters between the pattern of the chair arm and nervously straightening her hair

A visitor
A memory
Hold it tight.

Poetry Day 7:

The snow is unveiling the ripe earth, melt by slow melt
It is mud season in Wisconsin
where snow boots are decorated in mud
and wet gloppy trails grace your wood floors

Brave crocuses are peeking out
testing the air for Spring
We saw a robin resting in the Mulberry tree
just before driving to school Friday
and the rabbits are looking more
brown than white as they hunt for grass and
other green things

I am itching to plant seeds
ride bikes and go for walks
anything that brings the sun closer
and frees me from the indoors

Spring is less than subtle in Eau Claire
it is more like a happening
some grand party of color
that breaks up the white and brown

When will the daffodils come, asks Ehren
Soon says Mother Nature
Soon says mama




Poetry Day 8:

What are little girls made of?

Sugar and spice
and "well isn't that nice..."

I was made of hot South Carolina summers

escaping deep into the quiet
of pines and honey suckle
into the whisper and ripple
of the Broad River.

I was made of lazy afternoons with my dog Beau,
wading through creeks, and hopping over rocks
and water moccasins.

I was a tom boy with skinned knees
who loved climbing trees
squirmy tad poles in small pools.

sunning on the rocks in the river
and building twig forts

I was made of sunshine and mud.
Late afternoons, we'd trudge home
covered in dirt, with twigs in our hair, and wet
from the creeks and river.

I was made from adventures in
pine forests, flash light tag and fireflies

...sweet tea and a bubble bath at the
end of a long summer day.

Thursday, April 4, 2013

Poetry: Day 4

Kiernan

Wrinkled newborn hands clutching my hand
blue blanket swaddled and tight
I could stare at your face for hours
listening to the soft sighs you make
as you sleep

Yet I will sleep when you sleep
stumbling in a daze of sleep deprivation and bliss
There is no other time I will get to hold
you this long
and no other time you will look to me
for so much

giver of love and milk
singer, rocker, soother

Now you stand at my shoulder
you dance to a beat of your making
dreaming of ballet solos and designing
robots that will save the world

In this stream of growing up
I am continually letting you go as you take
your first steps-
you make wobbly circles on your bike
and keep moving further into your own

As you permit me
a particularly long hug, a snuggle with a book
and the honor of hearing your deep confidences

I think of this connection of hands across your life,
from the very first grip to when I will see you walk
across that graduation stage and take a diploma in that
same hand

I still check in on you at night
watching the soft rise of your chest
as you dream the dreams of the future
dreams of your own making.

Wednesday, April 3, 2013

30 Days of Poetry - Days 1-3

National Poetry Month: Day 1 

Never really gone...

Finding brief glimpses of the past
breathing like lost glimmers in bubbles in July picnic bliss
You are not where you are supposed to be
Yet you are finding me in my every moment

This is the summer of '82
Where the Riverbanks zoo has yellow jackets stingin
Where the rocks glisten in the Broad River
and yesterday was just a rollerskating bliss and maybe a few
stubbed toes or bent feelings

This is the tide rolling in at Ocean Isle
The crabs that skitter like a wave as I run across the sand
toes sticking to the wet beach
feet too small to keep up
hands to small to reach your hand before
you go.




Poetry month: Day 2 
Breaking

Sweeping away the crumbs 
Not needing what you
Left behind

Walking strong
Courage in stride and struggle
My rearview mirror is empty
And the road ahead
Cries hope

Life is never one path
But breaking a new trail feels right
Not like breaking an egg,
But somehow like being broken open...
Somehow breaking the pattern
And breaking free.




Poetry Month: Day 3

One less step

Eyes flash recognition
There is a small piece of you that understands
the cycle of things
as you step on the prepared, still earth

Booted feet crush seedlings
and the imprint of carelessness
leaves life waiting

This isn't the last time you will
tread or tear what is not yours
but perhaps you will think

before you drop that beer can
before you tread on my children's garden

My small protest will touch something inside
before you rush off
to text, to facebook, to forget
that you did something wrong.

At least I hope so.