Love

A Small Promise

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4.22 A Small Promise

He said come here and hold me
All throughout the night.
I’d love to, Love, but I’m afraid
I promised I would write.

Your kisses make me smile
And your arms are my delight
But I’ve a second rendez-vous
I promised I would write.

For I’m a woman of my word
And words give no respite
I’ll come back to your warm embrace
I promised I would write.

Who knows how long I waited
For the muses to alight?
Cursing that I ever said
I promised I would write.

Your sleepy hands reached for me
In the waning white moonlight
I took your hands and kissed them
I promised I would write.

And I’m a woman of my word
And the words are tucked in tight
So kiss me love for I am here
I promised I would write.

Empty Space / Love and Bouldering

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4.10 Empty Space

The empty space inside my head
Is vast, but ever shrinking
I find I bring my focus back
With patient, conscious thinking

Or else I stare at something bland
And let my hands meander
Perhaps they’ll write a shiny phrase
And my brain will take a gander.

I haven’t looked down at the keys
Which I know sounds most outlandish
Would you be kind enough to look
In case there’s something I accomplished?

****

4.11 Love and Bouldering

If I’m a bucket
You’re a crimp
We make an interesting climb
I’ll take your arms
You’ll need my fingers
We’ll make it up just fine
I’ll hold your feet
You take my toes
While we’re both in our prime
And when we’re up
We’ll trace back down
Let’s chalk it up to time

****

One Place to Start Loving Myself

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One Place to Start Loving Myself

Today it will be the top of my calf.
It’s a good place to start.
A place to start loving myself.
You’re not so bad, top of calf
You have an elegant curve.
You haven’t been sore today.
You let me jump a few inches off the ground in cardio
With you on my side,
I might not be so bad
So unappealing
So doomed…
It’s a start.

A Mother’s Day

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A Mother’s Day

Honesty politely asks I remind you
How often we fought over absolutely nothing.
How I held the needle that brought you pain,
But also made you laugh in the face of the Reaper
Who sat politely by the bedside, waiting.
Love was the undercurrent under our arguments.
We did not live in flowers, we did not bring hearts to each other.
We clashed as Amazons, and snarled like lions.
And when you left, I could not bear the joy of others.
Their sentiments made me wretch.
Their sugar hurt my molars.
Because they denied the truth of love,
Which is it survives and thrives in the blasted furrows
And binds the sharp edges of broken hearts.
Yet in the passing of time, I can take their flowers and hearts
And recognize our truth within them.
How we fought.
How we loved despite it.
Happy Mother’s Day.

Jovial Jane of the Spanish Main

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Jovial Jane of the Spanish Main
Was a saltwater woman in soul
Yet within the timbers of her heart
Rested a peculiar hole

Now, Jovial Jane of the Spanish Man
Had a very fine feathered hat.
She sent her foes to the briny depths
(But never harmed dog nor cat).

And Jovial Jane of the Spanish Main
Had a Damascus steel blade so light
She could the cut the heart out of a scurvy knave
Before even starting to fight.

Jovial Jane of the Spanish Main
Feared naught but the squall and reef
And woe to the wind or sandy shoal
That brought her ship to grief.

Jovial Jane of the Spanish Main
Sat in the crow’s nest above
And wondered if maybe the thing she was lacking
Was someone to trust and to love

So Jovial Jane of the Spanish Main
Picked up her compass and steel
Her fine feathered hat she set on her head
And planted her feet at the wheel.

Jovial Jane of the Spanish Main
Never stop sailing the blue
Because Jovial Jane of the Spanish Main
Was always looking for you.

Compassion

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We make the correct decision.
Our hearts are not in it.
To show mercy, compassion, and faith
Seems to yield little but bleeding.
We sense that rage and retribution
Are attractive alternatives.
That grinding a heel would feel
So. goddamn. satisfying.
But we open our arms all the same,
Sensing relief,
Anticipating pain.
We know the correct decision
Will always be tarnished by a second-tier truth:
That cruelty exists in us all.
Still we open our arms
In the faint and persistent hope of being better
than our baser selves.
Of achieving enlightenment from charity.
Our hearts are not in it.
Slapped a time too many to truly shine anymore,
All we can do is stretch out our arms
And try, once more, to heal.

Riffing

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Riffing: Airport: Astaire’s Fascinating Rhythm Part I

(A stream of consciousness poem)

I’m sitting but not still

I’m drumming digits quick and repetitious until

You walk through my peripheral vision

A vision of potential, of a shared beat

Will you remain my refrain?

Will you create heat?

My thumb ceases making up tempos,

And in rapid succession fall

Index, middle, ring, pinkie

all come to rest upon the armrest

of my uncomfortable chair

and I am, finally,

.Still.

Until

You reach my other peripheral

And keep on walking down the terminal

Because you were but a syncopation

And not my crescendo

Not my coda

You create staccato

I am not one to

Get up and move, dance, emulate movies

Or create unnecessary heartache,

Rather let my fingers go back to drumming

Except now I’m humming

A merry tune of nothing

Since a syncopating rhythm

Was Astaire’s way of saying

Breaking a beat

Can be sweet.

Don’t you think?

—

Boredom can lead to wonderful exercises in creativity. Boredom allows for the most intricate daydreams.

But boredom can be boring, so better to do something.

Like write.