Embers

Restless in sleep, the dreams run
dark and dripping, light and floating
rodents slink between roots
falcons dive through city fog
as embers gleam their delicious memories

Moving Mountains

I do not want hawk wings.
I want levitation.

I do not want cheetah legs.
I want teleportation.

But spare me telepathy,
the burden of all minds and hearts-

let me ponder in wonder
the vast weight of memory,

the lifetime of experience
in every person around me.


#NaPoWriMo 29/30

Cruel Death

Death may be merciful, an end to long suffering,
but more often it seems cruel, or at least uncaring
while we are rendered mute and mindless:
“senseless tragedy”
                      “the unimaginable”
                                            “I don’t know what to say”

How much crueler is this death, then? This woman severed
from her sister by closed doors, pandemic precautions,
heartbeats abruptly silenced, breaths lost to sterile air
unresponsive
                       unrecoverable
                                                DNR, DNI

How cruel to be pronounced dead by a doctor
who has never seen her alive, for me to wake up
her sister to inform her of what little I know
to change her life
                                    with the loss of another.


#NaPoWriMo 28/30

Sun, Water, Growth

a leaf unfurling
to accept a ray of light
and share the sun’s gift

rain falls staccato
as rivers flow legato
vapor da capo


#NaPoWriMo 27/30

The Busy Bee

The busiest of bees
humming along to flower after flower
collecting nectar and pollen
of every type and color
building a home and feeding a family
while exploring the horizon
in every direction   - a miracle
- a wonder     - an inspiration


#NaPoWriMo 26/30

A Successful Calculation

The world wanders in search of success
wondering what it is, how to attain it.
Is a successful day achieved by average,
or perhaps its beginning or end?
What about a successful life -
by the height of its glorious acme
or by the sum of its worst moments?
And by whom will judgment be passed?
By you, by my neighbor,
by God, by my children?
Whoever, I hope not by me -
such a careful task it must be
to weigh smiles of sunflowers
and rolls of thunder, to ask
the wind and stars what
tales they’ve witnessed.


#NaPoWriMo 25/30

Paune bara baje

Almost midnight, neon signs blaze
clock ticking, moonlit designs
cast through the trees, the window
over my feet, shadow sandals shifting

as I drift by candlelight
afloat on thin air just long enough
to feel like flying over lunar craters
somersaulting, star-hopping carelessly

in my pajamas, catching air
catching a breath and holding it
until the clock strikes upward
hands clasped together in prayer.


#NaPoWriMo 24/30

Walking the Edge

Between death and life there lies an edge
thin as spiderweb, long as a moonless sky.
Everyone moves toward it, some racing
at breakneck pace and others dawdling
with enough time to smell the sweet peas
and perhaps to see the sunset fall.

These days, many folk end up meandering
unsteadily along the edge, sometimes losing
balance and teetering over the edge,
only to be pulled back by us in the nick of time.
Indeed, this multitude requires such attention
that we have hardly any to spare for the rest.

And so we tend to the edge, walk along it
alongside these wanderers, hoping to guide
and to stand between them and despair.
Between life and death we stand,
as both guardians and gatekeepers
holding hands and letting them go.


#NaPoWriMo 23/30

The truth is a petty thunderstorm

The truth is a petty thunderstorm
invisible in a cloudy night
mocking my best attempts to find it,

then blinding in its intensity
when lightning flashes upward,
deafening in its thunderous crash.

It looms so much larger than me,
so much more definitively real
despite its intangibility.

I sit helpless in my apartment,
unable to search it out,
touch it or - dare I say - change it,

all I can do is to stay and watch
so that when it flashes forth I am
ready, waiting to be blinded.


#NaPoWriMo 22/30

(Prompt courtesy of a roll of #MetaphorDice by Taylor Mali)

The Twisted Prism

The hardest part of this, to be honest,
is capturing midnight in the first place.
The aching wait until the next new moon,
the careful focusing and reflection
into a clean jar lined with ivory
paint to hold in the elusive darkness.

Now, most people will tell you to just pour
it over your prism and catch what falls.
Inefficient, with the spill of midnight,
plus your colors won’t react properly.
Lucky for you, you’re learning from the best;
I’ll let you in on a little secret.

Put your prism in the jar beforehand,
and once you’ve caught your midnight, let it sit
for a few weeks, or better a few years.
You’ll get your usual blood red, bone white
but time rewards the patient colorist:
firefly green, wolf-eye yellow, twilight blue.

Those for whom the night is an acquaintance,
or worse an enemy, will never know
what lies beyond the death, will never see
the colors of life hidden in darkness.
It is up to you to teach them, young lass-
to love cold midnight as they love the dawn.


#NaPoWriMo 21/30

"Good morning!!"

Your texted "Good morning!!" lingers in my mind

like the humming chime of flying blueberries
striking the metal bowl you use to wash them,

like the savory bliss of your dal in my mouth,
its warm glow tingling down my throat to my chest,

like the sweet scent of the lavender you bought
and then carefully arranged throughout our home,

like the heart-skip sight of your smile as we wave
good night before turning away to our beds.


#NaPoWriMo 20/30

Some Flowers

Some flowers are words, meaningful alone
but significant only when strung together.

Some are statements by themselves,
some entire stories grown in the past
and blossoming in the present.

And some flowers are poems
revealing secret emotions, hidden truths

when arranged a certain way and
shared with a special someone
at just the right moment.

#NaPoWriMo 19/30

So you'd like to buy a bell

So you’d like to buy a bell today
but which bell would be best?
A jingle bell, a bell that clangs,
a bell that hangs or one that stands?

An array of bells fills this chest
and you may pick but one
just one, by the sound you hear
standing there six feet away.

Not fair, you say? Why, I agree!
But you came here for a bell
not justice or fairness or
anything in between.

So pick your bell and carry it
with you wherever you live-
let it sit on your desk
or swing from your door,

let it blare all day long
or just for a moment,
let its song ring just for you
or sing out to many more,

but let it sing, let it ring, let it
tingle your toes and tickle your nose,
let it echo through the halls
and reverberate through your bones.

#NaPoWriMo 18/30

It was dark inside the wolf

Sometimes when people go to the emergency room
they never go home.
They are swallowed up by the health care system.

In the hospital, they are masticated, parts
torn away - sometimes whole organs -
a gallbladder, an appendix
or smaller pieces - perhaps a sliver of liver,
or blood, that coveted commodity -
the sicker the patient the more of it stolen.

Not to mention sanity fractured
by interrupted sleep, humanity shattered
away from friends, family, home.

Sometimes when people go to the emergency room
they are churned slowly between hospital and rehab
complications and comorbidities igniting
each other, a slow-motion chemical chain reaction
that ends as often with CODE BLUE!
as it does with a whispered whimper.

#NaPoWriMo 17/30

Stardust

The sun’s candle dims as night rises over it
starry seedlings peek out of dark soil
beaming up to this point in their sky
a million million blessings waiting to grow

#NaPoWriMo 16/30

Cutting Vegetables

Safety first you must keep your fingers
no before that

Recipe first you must choose a
wait step back a second

Purpose first you must love
yes at least care
hold that in your heart
send it through your hands
cut it into your food
and into someone’s stomach.

From care comes consideration
for the eater’s mouth, for their tongue,
for their ability to enjoy each bite.
From love blossoms perfectionism.

No one to love?
No one to cook for, to care for?
No problem. Cook for yourself.
Love yourself.

#NaPoWriMo 15/30

To Be Kirby

to breathe in the wind and breathe out
the tornado whirling inside me

to absorb water and slip
flexibly around any obstacle

to make my heart stone and shield
myself against sharp blades and cutting words

to dance with fire and spread
warmth and light, to stoke high my inner flame

to hold within the infinite
potential that lies outside of me

to take inspiration as I inspire
and exhale to start anew

#NaPoWriMo 14/30

Think Again

If you propose an idea because
it was the first one that caught your mind's eye
there may be brighter bulbs shining within

“Why did I think that?”

think again
and if you have the time
think again

“What if I‘m wrong?”

for if your brain can contemplate galaxies
there are an infinity of thoughts waiting
to fly through your mind in hopes of getting caught

“What else could be true?”

another universe blinks a testable
or perhaps untestable reality,
your second thought, or your third thought, or your fourth

#NaPoWriMo 13/30

"Do Everything"

He lays in his hospital bed,
frail, exhausted,
after a “routine” MRI last evening
had been read overnight,
the results conveyed this morning:
“5cm tumor of the left frontal convexity of the skull,”
one star in a constellation of metastases
speckled over his skeleton.

He stares me down
raises a finger
declares that he’s a fighter
(which I know, by now)
and tells me to promise him
to do everything.

Well then.
Everything’s a big ask
but then
everything always is.

He tells me to listen
to him and his family,
to the story of his story,
to know how he is, how he got here,
where he thought he was going,

to try to comprehend the incomprehensible,
this shatter-glass vertigo of
dread, denial,
despair.

He tells me to lift
him from bed for an
admittedly unsteady
walk down the hallway.
He tells me to lift
up his weathered spirit
on wings of will and wishes.

He tells me to talk
with his wife and his doctor,
to talk about the years ahead
and what to do with them
to talk him through the tornado
that has whirled down upon him.

He tells me to care
for his mind as I care
for his brain, and to care
for his soul as I care
for his heart.

He asks me to stay for just a moment.
I tell him I have a few moments to give
before everything comes knocking.

#NaPoWriMo 12/30

Exposure

The sun has shattered the window pane
light streaming in flooding the room
filling every crack leaving no shadow
in which to crawl to hide to live

my every movement casts ripples
scattered waves reflecting
into open skies open ears open eyes

no action or inaction unnoticed
no speech or breath unheard
no life or death uncounted

love lives here with pain and joy
all watered with memory’s tears
once in shade but now in heatstroke
wilting under this bright sunbeam

#NaPoWriMo 11/30

The Weight of Tomorrow

When you think that you’re done for the day
You had best keep on chugging away
For tomorrow‘s approaching,
With its own work encroaching -
On tonight’s anxious mind it will weigh. 

#NaPoWriMo 10/30

After Work

You welcome my nose with garlic, ginger, onion
as I open the door at seven-o-clock.
We dance around each other on the kitchen floor
my chopping and washing an accompaniment
to your soup spoon stirring and spice tadka sizzling,
waves of cumin and pepper wafting through the room.
You wonder if it will soak into our sofa
and I agree, hoping it never leaves, this smell
of you, of home, of warm love and happy dinners.

We sit on our sofa, our intrepid air plant
perched in its tea cup growing out of the cover
of Botanicum center stage on the table,
somehow still holding onto its purple flowers
dried darker upon a tall wheat-colored stalk.
I had never been one to collect such trinkets
but I find myself smiling at this yet again,
at the fact that I cannot imagine our home
without these sweet touches you have left everywhere.

We sit at this coffee table you’ve set with love
with our plants around us and warm dinner within,
my phone open with today’s New York Times crossword
puzzling our way through mystery and frustration.
Sometimes we win, sometimes we don’t, sometimes we speak
so fast it's as if we're having conversations,
sometimes we struggle to find words, sometimes we laugh
at how close we were, how one of us got sleepy
enough for us to stop and get ready for bed.

#NaPoWriMo 9/30

Words x People x Time

Unfixed language churns its roiling 
boil of people talking typing 
taking liberties mistaking 
mix-and-matching patching coiling 
words around each other breaking 
down and cooking up enhancing 
some words dulling others rising 
out of bubbling chaos meaning.

#NaPoWriMo 8/30

From seed to seed

In high school biology, my teacher planted seeds. 
They didn’t all grow, naturally, 
but mine by chance was sown deep, 

and I tended to it daily: 
I read it countless books, 
I told it all the things I’d learned, 
I asked around how best to fertilize it, 
and let that advice bloom freely 

and so here we are ten years later 
my seed a jaunty sapling still filled 
with all the optimism I’d poured over it 
begging me to take its seeds and shower them 
from coast to coast and perhaps even farther
and hope for even more 
seeds and more 
saplings, more 
trees and more 
teachers. 

So perhaps, when this storm passes 
as storms do 
there will be some forests left standing 
and perhaps 
a few of those trees will be mine 
to nurture 
to let go to let grow on their own. 

#NaPoWriMo 7/30

Two Haiku

this forest’s birdsong 
harmonizing one moment 
raucous the next 

to watch from the shore 
wind and sun play on the waves 
a firework display

#NaPoWriMo 6/30 

Woven Sense

First comes lavender
quarantined by cotton seams in plush pockets
yet lavishing the room in an incense of spring

just as the patchwork colors seem to seep
beyond the quilt’s confines into every corner.
The fabric breathes in, the fibers stretch out
under the warmth of the window-framed sun.

Last come memories
slow to wake from their multicolored beds
where they were laid to rest and stitched in place

one by one, eight by eight distinct
squares snatched from time over years,
over decades passed by wonder and boredom
and caught together in this continuous lattice.

#NaPoWriMo 5/30

Spring, do your thing!

daffodils bobbing their butter-yellow heads
looking up to the sun that raised them

pussywillows swaying in billowing winds
white cushions pushed out of dark branches

wildflowers dancing in bold flowy ball gowns
like sunset islands in a green sea

#NaPoWriMo 4/30

A Wandering Smile

One of the signs outside your door screams “NO VISITORS”
so I find only silence keeping you company.
Delirium stalks you, frail and stranded from your herd,
the vulnerability of illness compounded
by the ball and chain of loneliness and seclusion.

My smile wants to let you know that I am here for you
but it cannot get past my polypropylene mask;
it wanders up and down searching for a way to you
from my eyes to your eyes
                                               through a plane of plastic
from my hand to your hand
                                                  through a layer of latex
buzzing by my vocal cords to reach your empty ears
in small words floating through the filtered air between us.

#NaPoWriMo 3/30

Reasonable people may disagree

on this issue which is to say 
that in the minestrone soup of 
life there swim at least some morsels 
whose value may be a matter of taste

not to worry we can agree to agree 
that we‘ll never agree on whether 
the beans are more integral than the pasta 
to its quintessential flavor 

and in our spare time we may disagree 
unreasonably on anything we wish 
for we agree variety is the spice of life 
but minestrone mustn’t be too spicy

#NaPoWriMo 2/30

The Nest

They were told that their grip might‬ ‪

be strangling me, that despite‬ ‪

all the danger they could not‬ ‪

keep me forever just caught‬ ‪

in the nest they’d made for me.‬ ‪

They are told that this virus 

waits hidden, that their children‬ ‪

long gone from their home just want‬ ‪

them to keep themselves safely‬ 

‪here in the nest, far away from harm.‬


#NaPoWriMo 1/30