Category: patience

afterwards

images

 

She picked up his bones

scattered in the yard,

and took them into the house.

 

Her workshop was cluttered;

so she cleaned off a spot, and

orderly stacked them up.

 

Days went by, then weeks,

and finally years. The bones

collected dust like mementos.

 

One day, stumped, she looked

up from her work, and saw

the neatly stacked dry bones.

 

She laughed as she remembered

him, then went to work:

drilling, weaving, balancing.

 

She sang as she worked, happy

at last to be creating so freely

from his humble remains.

 

Finished, she took what she had

made from him, and hung

it from an old oak tree.

 

It danced a hollow dance,

clattering as the bones clacked

together with every wind.

 

In the evenings she would sit,

and sip a glass of wine, happier

than she had ever been with him.

 

(August 7, 2018)

Teaching

IMG_3451

 

I’m not sure I do much,

but open doors, set up chairs,

provide a place to read,

talk, write; which is enough

and yet, is not enough

to beat back the belligerence

barking like a spittle-flecked

beast. I can’t save them

from what is to come,

nor always be there to speak

amiably into their distress,

and voiceless traumas.

But there is this room,

an open door, and a chair.

 

(March 27, 2018)

the simplicity of rain and chickens

bur-oak-spring-catkins-rain-dew-water_vneoqqzqig__S0000

 

i hear a line

then forget

 

between the day’s

distractions

 

and duties

to write the thought

 

and so it goes

and later

 

without paper

I remember

 

again

then forget

 

again when

I have time

 

to write the line

which keeps

 

eluding me

 

so little time

to write

 

to remember

what one sees

 

enough to detail

the slow flow

 

of the rain drop

as it makes

 

its way along

the porcelain

 

yard ornament

near the old

 

burr oak

 

(February 9, 2018)