Belated Words

Write On!

Tag: poems

  • Vanity Doors

    Vanity Doors

    They are known, the techniques, the rules

    gleaned by trial and error over centuries

    from diverse cultures by millions of craftsmen.

     

    But, this time, I could not mar this flow of grain

    gifted from a giant red oak stricken down;

    could not deface streaks of red hues

    of stomata streams painting the truth

    of ice and fire, abundance and deprivation;  

    of hard times and good of a hundred years. 

     

    I could not chop it up

    into stiles

    and rails

    and panels:

    narrow boards arranged

    in alternating cups

    and glued

    and clamped

    and sanded

    and sealed;

    just to obtain a stillness;

    an entity that could never twist and breathe.

     

    I lay the boards, in their order,

    to picture a whole, a life lived;

    a chance to speak after death.

     

    In summer when I suck the humidity away

    to cool and condition air for my comfort,

    the doors move; warp a bit, opening a crack,

    emitting the dark which whispers tales.

    They cup, creeping to complete the circle

    from which they was sawn,

    seeking the completion every creature knows.

  • Greed

    Perhaps, I am too quick to call it greed;
    this yearning for an accumulation,
    this lust of Mine!, self gratification,
    a trophy case to cram with coin or heads
    or banned ivory trinkets carved of tusk.
    The rich, they give but not without receipts,
    and accolades, and plaques to hang above their names.
    Nature demands a self-interest if we
    are to survive, I know, but studies show:
    the poor are more generous than the rich,
    percentage wise, of course. What does that say?
    One thing to me….. another thing to you.
    What of a heart more soothed by treasures’ lure
    than smiles of thanks of a person in need?
    Perhaps, I am too quick to call it greed;
    one thing to me……another thing to you.

  • Packing Your Bag

    You’re a ten digit pin# now
    allowed three changes of clothes
    nothing with strings. Do bra straps count?
    Your clothes and mine
    separate now
    hang and lie
    suddenly
    dingy and mute.
    Now removed for your safety
    protected
    not from me but from yourself
    I have no choices to make
    but your wardrobe.
    You never see it coming
    until you must crucify yourself
    create a display and hope someone
    can remove spikes and treat wounds.
    Each time you’re broken apart
    reassembled by chemical agents
    restitched without patterns
    and
    always there are left over bits
    flotsam puffed away, out of sight
    like lint in a dryer vent
    your color, your fabric left diminished.

  • Mourning Dove

    In grass beneath the ravaged feeder,

    accepting rejected seed dropped

    or flung away by purple finch,

    the pair bob thanks that go unseen

    except by me.

     

    Sated, they ascend

    to birdbath rim, meekly chanting,

    seeking permission few could deny.

    In monkish semblance they drink.

    Again, sated…

     

    they lift with

    white-tipped, feather robes trailing

    to sing in calls we’ve name mourning

    but which can only be joyous coos

    of gratitude.

     

    What watcher first

    saw the dove as symbol of peace

    of hope, of love, of a risen god?

    I’ve lived a lifetime and only now

    I ask this question?

  • The Portal

    buddleias 013

    My friend laments her passing years

    As lost, as nothing now.  But wait,

    Dear one, I disagreed, they’re there;

    Just out of sight and sound, secured,

    Waiting behind memories door.

    You probably walked past them this morning

    Admiring your gardens offerings.  Your cheek

    Just graced their hiding place as you sniffed,

    Then snapped malingering blooms.  They’re there,

    Passed buddleias purple cones, above

    Rudbeckias stylized suns, behind

    Hollyhocks rust/blotched leaves.

    Don’t be afraid; slip your slender hand

    Up to your thin, white wrist into the mass

    And turn like a key.

  • “Et tu, Brute?”

    I read his obit today; the who

    what where when but not the how.

    I had missed him, felt his absence

    But put it down to his capriciousness.

    Last week, his body, such as it was,

    Was found, fittingly, behind the file

    Marked “Lost and Found”

    Beside the head librarian’s desk;

    A feeble attempt at humor, as was,

    The hand-lettered sign strung round

    His neck by string, naming him….Muse.

    Cause of his passing was indeterminable

    Due to the condition of the form.

    I suspect years of abuse at the hands

    Of the likes of me and the laureates.

    No charges were filed:

    There was too little evidence

    Or too many possible suspects;

    It was all unclear. The case is closed.

    •

    Plans for internment will be announced

    When a proper eulogy can be obtained.

  • Deadheading

    deadheading 013 

    I wait too long, dreading the pinching of the bloom;

    the trashing of faded glory limply browning.

    Rampant roses prick my intent with minute thorns

    for severing when scent sings sweetest.

    Now, flaccid sheaths, daylily blooms bleed

    pomegranate/pink flora blood on my fingers

    as I grasp to snap them from their kin.

    Remove the old and the new will flourish;

    we say over and over; true, or only a mantra

    we chant to appeased our aversions to what

    we see as the useless weak and unsightly?

    After the pinch I let them lie at their makers feet

    to sing in final sweetness of summation;

    to remain and bask and seep back to the whole.

  • Free Will

    This is where I hang: exposed to dry air;

    Filleted in equal pink pieces to parch

    In low, fly/buzzed humidity, to shrink

    to the leathery truth.  Deprived of the

    justification gene, I can make no

    excuse; can’t blame father, mother, a god

    or circumstance or fate.  Am I so blessed or cursed?

  • Dying in the Woods

    The time will come

    when I will walk away:

    a farewell tour escaping bed-

    ridden incarceration

    before the doped dozing;

    the un-tethering.

    I will limp among the pines

    scenting their needles

    and remembrance’s lust,

    which will only soften,

    make more palatable,

    my final meal of leaves

    and tiny creatures;

    my final savorings

    plucked from ample offerings

    .

  • farm books

     

     They were the first books from memories’ beginnings;

    even the Bible Storybook followed after.

    A sentimental claim could have saved them, ensured

    their survival from crazy mother fire she flung

    to send her gelatinous demons home to Hell

    from the closet shared with the stacked, forgotten books.

    With them flamed up my pre-school doodles penciled on

    endpapers.  The text pages, slick as ice, rebuffed

    pencil’s reticent lead, while end sheets craved caress.

    Too pristine; stiff covers of muted blues and grays,

    greens, even reds; inside: over-exposed pictures

    of breeds of hogs, cattle, fowl…crop rotation charts

    that, I would swear, were never glimpsed before my eyes.

    We never talked of books or little else; always

    at work even when sick (coming home pale to fall,

    “burning-up” to his hard bed).  He would never read

    his “farm books” bought by Uncle Sam as his reward

    for surviving battlefields in France, Belgium;

    in tiny towns…only words… he struggled to say.

    What was an Alabama boy who barely read

    to do, but wed the pretty girl waiting back home,

    and care for cotton, corn, durocs, chickens and kids?

    Tenant farming fail through.  Mother still talks of wind

    blowing bitter cold up through floorboard cracks and the

    silent rat snake, “This long!” falling from the attic’s

    dark scary hole to hit the kitchen floor, plop!

    beside her as she churned butter for our cornbread.

    (Only Sunday she had prayed for just an onion

    to eat with beans and the last of the “side meat.”)

    Poor snake, more startled than she, died a riving death

    by her cotton chopping hoe, twisting till sunset.

    Daddy, too gentle, kind…always the provider,

    “too good for his own good”, delivered milk or bread

    or pumped gas always smiling the rest of his life;

    accepting grueling hours like penitence…for what?

    The books?

    Still I summon the scent and feel of their dated

    knowledge and hope gone stale.  I remember, it was

    mother’s suggestion, her offering to me, to draw

    in Daddy’s books.