TEARS

Pushing

and

Straining 

I can pretend these tears are for you

But they are not

They are not

Dreams

I clasped your hand

Fingertips to fingertips

and pulled your hand toward mine

I opened your palm

And traced

“I want u”

You said you wanted to be alone

Alone with me

WANNA GO TO A COLDPLAY CONCERT?

We could stand front to back 

with your arms around my bosom

Our faces brightened by the lights

and the exhilaration of being together

MY FATHER LOVED MY MOTHER

When they were young, he used to joke, “For a fat broad, you don’t smell bad.”

When they were older, he still would joke, “For a fat broad, you don’t smell bad.”

Other would scoff and be offended 

But he loved her as much when she was thin

As when she was fluffy 

That’s what I want in a man

PRIVATE

You were the only one I kissed on that beach

Your warm hands in my hair and on my skin

Side by side in love and purpose

Reveling in our innocence

Later, I lived on that beach

And had water access via wooden stairs

The tide had washed away any trace

But the memory still lingers

MOON POEM 447

The moon looks like a flashlight

shrouded by a bedsheet

Its folds creating dark bands of light

A sunny side egg 

with pepper

A halo moon

3/19/98

ALONE

I spent so many years
fearing being alone
And when it finally seemed like a possibility
I learned to embrace it

WE HAVE SO MANY GOOD THINGS AHEAD OF US

How could you take what you took
and never give a second look
How could you give what you gave
and have no desire to save

Was your speech just practice?
Were you just warming up
For a performance not yet played
Another woman to show up

you jerked my heart out
and made it yours
and I was trying so hard not to fall

Why did you have to do it?
Why did you have to hold it?
Did you have to possess me?

CLOUDS

Sometimes a poem is in my mind

as a whole

a brain cloud of completeness

that rains on the page

Other times

there are scattered showers

and the words and phrases come out in snippets

sometimes these bits can water the idea sufficiently

so a full-grown poem can form

sometimes they die in the ground for lack of water

or effort

THE LITTLE GIRL IN THE WOODS

When she was about seven or eight

she was playing in the woods

when she came upon a neighbor's older brother

he had his pants down

and he grabbed her

she wriggled away

but was filled with shame over the event

When she was ten

her mother was recovering from a routine hysterectomy

she had developed a blood clot

so the family arrived at the hospital

but they left her and her twin sister in a waiting room

as they went in and said their goodbyes

When their mother had breathed her last

her father and siblings streamed passed the waiting room

crying and dabbing their eyes

leaving them behind

until they ran to catch up with them

In his grief and misguided attempt to shield them

their father put them on the bus for day camp

she they cried on the way there

and a girl on the bus said,

"I hope they are not going to cry all day."

Once they arrived

she hid in the woods

until it was time to go home

DREAM

I can still feel

your taut warm skin

on my hands

my arms

my breasts

we lived in a world that

embraced our nakedness

So you climbed into the back seat of the car

to be close to me

to recline on my chest

and to turn your eyes toward a shared interest

But then they came

to break up our love

and shame you for a less-than-spotless past

I knew the ending of the tragedy

yet took your nephew to play on the swings

and the alarm stole me away

CUT GRASS

 It's the best smell in the world

Apart from my favorite climbing rose

and balsam

campfire smoke

and food on the grill

babies

and the sea

TRAVEL IS A FEELING

Travel is a feeling

that swells in your heart

You may forget the music that played in Hyde Park

or the name of that cafe on the Champs Élysées

But you'll never forget the warm glow

that filled you to brimming

and made you glad to be alive

BETTER THAN BEING ALONE

People say,

"I would rather be alone rather than married to him,"

as if being alone is bad

but at least not as bad as being with him

When being alone

means cooking Gallo Pinto

while taking belts (that's what my mother calls it)

from a Jack Daniel's bottle

That ain't bad

That's the best

The Shameful Stamp

• Imagine

if the anti-Irish sentiment

that waned mid century 

was as relentless and unremitting

as the anti-semitism that still permeates 

so many cultures of the world

we were donkeys fresh off the boat

both a description of our brawn

and a disparagement

micks, and paddies, and harps

bogtrotters if we did not have the privilege of education

in southern parts, hillbillies was a term that first applied to us

but now

we have St. Patrick's Day

and parades

where everyone is suddenly Irish

and begging a kiss

but they

have protests

with torches

and hate

GLOBETROTTING

When you view it on a map

it looks so far away

but our apartment was mere steps from your front door

The trek to town was longer

but the view of the Reek was worth it

We toasted here and there and there

and tipped the best bartender

so that he could fill

the most enormous empty Powers Whiskey bottle

with all our loose change

UNTITLED

There you are

that fatal moment

standing on the edge

Just when you

think no one's looking

I see you pick your wedge

7/29/1998 - Pierce Pettis at Club Passim

RSVP

Why do I rehearse disappointment?

When all signs are pointing toward

being forgotten

or left out

I prepare myself for the blow

no phone call

a gut punch

DANCING WITH MYSELF

I've felt the earth shake

and I've seen the breeze blow

I've savored so many of the world's delights

The world's best cinnamon bun

praline feuilletine

beef bourguignon

a rain dripped raspberry with the smell of mint 

crushing under my feet 

And yet

I'm watching the tip burn down

closer and closer to the end of the cigarette

 

1989

When your music entered my life

I was thirteen years old

I was a woman

when your music entered my soul

And like a thread knotted and sewn

from then until now

you've been there

through the breakups

and breakdowns

as dependable as the changing of the seasons

And guiding me forward

toward the twilight sky