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Archive for January, 2022

In the Nursing Home, a Poem

Posted in inspiration, tagged , , , , , , , , on January 28, 2022| Leave a Comment » 

Our lives can't be measured by our final years, of this I am sure. 
(Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook)

In the Nursing Home

They call the shower
a car wash. Every other day,
lathered head to toe,

the loose-skinned residents
sit exposed on a shower chair.
Who am I?

A tiny, bent-over man,
eyes bulging,
stares through the drops,

feels himself dissolve, 
slips down the drain 
with the suds.

Who was I before
these veins raised up blue
and held tight to something?

Or to someone?
He closes his eyes
and sees flickering darkness.

Gone are his long-ago wife
and the daughter who avoids
his blank expression. 

Life hides somewhere among
the oak and maple in the courtyard,
full some years, barren others, 

among his hand-crafted bird houses,
forgotten now, splintered, rotted,   
as the man’s attendant

lifts his dried arms
into a fresh shirt
he doesn’t recognize.

Then, residents gather at round tables.
A man smiles. He nods back,
as he listens to vague stories about

their car washes. Frowns, snickers.
And where-is-the-salt-
for-this-gosh-awful-soup?

While the common room piano
waits for someone to play,
with a voice strong enough

to sing the songs
these walls know
without breaking.

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If A Sweet Gum Could Speak

Posted in inspiration, tagged , , , , , , , on January 21, 2022| Leave a Comment » 

If A Sweet Gum Could Speak
 
Don’t pray for lighter burdens, but for stronger backs. Nothing 
endures but personal qualities. Those who endure, conquer. 
(Rodney A. Winters)
My partners and I in the yard share the same name, sweet gum. 
In the autumn our star leaves create a varied pallet of orange, 
yellow, and green. A scene worth painting or watching from the 
window as birds visit.
We stand bare now. My branches reach out at a different angle 
than the trees next to me. We are individual, beautiful, rooted in the earth.
Touch my surface. Cold is okay. More than okay. 
Can you imagine how weak you would be if high winds never tested you. 
Yes, I am aware of the rest of the earth. It affects me. When you
 trim my dead branches. When leaves appear or drop. I don’t have speech.
 I do have presence.
Thanks for celebrating this moment with me. 
January, like life itself, ends. Celebrate it while it is here.

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If Only, a Poem

Posted in inspiration, tagged , , , , , , , on January 14, 2022| Leave a Comment »

To move freely you must be deeply rooted. (Bella Lewitzky)

 

IF ONLY

If peace were a bird, it would fly through heat or wind. 
It would thrive in a nest open to storm.


If peace were a mountain,
it would stand patient,
constant, firm for centuries.

If peace were a tree, it would begin
as an acorn, unafraid of darkness,

then grow to house birds,
and reach for mountains.

Peace. It transcends
mountain borders, 
and allows foreign bird species
to nest together

despite unseen possibilities.



originally published in For a Better World 2011

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The Pawn, a Poem

Posted in inspiration, tagged , , , , , , on January 8, 2022| Leave a Comment » 

Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves. (Carl Gustav Jung)

THE PAWN

A young man props open the door
to his screened-in porch
as a robin, wild, wings flapping, dives
into the wire mesh walls.
The man gestures toward the exit
and mutters about how creatures,
two-legged or flying,
refuse to be rescued.

He locks the door to his house
and leaves the screen door open, 
then crosses the street
to learn the tricks of chess
from an elderly neighbor.

The older man offers him a seat
at his kitchen table,
where a set of yellowed-white 
and chipped-black game pieces 
wait on a well-worn board.

The master’s game is sharp.
As he plays, he speaks
of his sons and daughters
and their plans for him
to move to a nursing home,
the place the old man 
calls incontinence hell.

He describes shirts with elbows bared,
gifts from his deceased wife,
removed without his permission,
She lives in those shreds. 

The young man tries to follow both
his teacher’s stories 
and his advice about the game
until the old man shakes his head.

Because you are learning I will let you
try that move again.
But the student sees 
only worn-black and dull-white wood,
 perfect squares with impenetrable borders.

Checkmate. 

The old man shows no sign of triumph.
He resets the board.
The young man nods, silent,
wondering if the robin
found passage—or not.  



pic made from public domain drawing, cut paper, and pastels

poem previously published in For a Better World 2014

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Dear 101st Birthday, Dad

Posted in inspiration, tagged , , , on January 2, 2022| Leave a Comment »

broken angel

When we think of the past it’s the beautiful things we pick out. We want to believe it was all like that. (Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale)

Happy 101st Birthday, Dad!

I have this image of a cartoon. On the outside of a closed door is a sign that reads: miscellaneous. Papers stick-out from all sides. Recently, I shredded or recycled notes that could have been in Sanskrit. It was about time I eliminated the clutter. Other items struck me as precious finds. Jewels at the bottom of a deep sea.

If he were alive my father would be 101 the first day of this year. In the chaos I found this fantasy letter I wrote for him on his birthday in 2004.

***

Dear Dad,

This story is fiction. After all, I don’t recall anything that happened before I was two. However, I am imagining talking to the angel in charge of directing new souls. In the tale, fresh individuals can request either a young father or mother to-be, with the approval of higher authority of course.

The angel on duty sighed a lot as I chose my dad. I mean, perfect wasn’t possible, and the angel kept telling me, “You need to learn from life.  Not live on some comfy cloud like a particle of icy elements. Think carefully…”

I took the guide literally and checked-out earth in the 1940’s for half of forever.

He got testy after I finished the tenth global spin. “The boss didn’t take this long when he chose his son’s mother. Give me your best-daddy data. Now.”

He entered the statistics on this computer that was part cloud and part moving keyboard. At this time only manual typewriters existed on earth, the kind that required a complete redo when the user made a mistake on the last line. “You do have non-cusser on my list.”

“I got it. I got it.”

I add, “I will need someone who can fix things. You know, a man with good mechanical sense.”

The angel shook his head and then looked into the store of talents I would have and nodded. “Oh yes, you will have creative abilities. However, you will need help in the practical field. Please take you-know out of that sentence. I have a sense your future father won’t like that habit.”

“Make him a generous carpenter.” I added.

“So now you are asking for Joseph II.” The angel sighed.

That’s when I saw you, Dad. In Africa. In an army uniform. “Yes! I decided.”

“Are you ready to see who he will marry as soon as the war is over? Dad’s busy taking bombs apart before they explode right now.”

The angel turned a switch and I saw a short woman with blue eyes and natural brown curls. A great cook.

“Okay, let me know when to be ready.”

“You’ll know. Believe me. You’ll know.”

 Sometime before the birth process I lost all recollection of this story and grew up like every human does. I think it’s supposed to be that way. However, I am glad I made a heck of a good choice. Happy birthday to a super father, even if this page reveals more imagination than fact.

(And maybe an edited word or two… or three.)

The angel in the above photo fell, broke, and had a botched super-glue surgery. Nevertheless, she never dropped her light. She is also a statue; the injury becomes metaphorical. No one escapes pain and loss. May we continue anyway.

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