The weather is confused right now.
Gray skies are followed by white lies
That melt away into the pools,
And trees look like they’ve begun
To shoot their buds and grow.
But freezing weather makes every step
Across the yard treacherous,
And winds howl with such gusto
Makes one think it’ll never be Spring again!
Some days the sun shines
And as I wait for water bucket to fill
I draw moonscapes with my breath in the air.
Other days I take my hat
And stuff it into my pocket
And slip and slide as I make my way
Up the hill for a view
That may tell me, give me some hope,
Of a Spring that is just around the corner.
Tag: pocket
Frozen And Walking Without Gloves (day 3115)
Rotating pockets
With hands
Squinting
Dark You Dark (day 2751)
I wrote a poem for you
That felt like a lifetime
It wove its way through dark corners
Of suspicious bars
That looked sideways
And smelt like
The sticky lacquer
Melting off the wooden bar table.
It isn’t enough that you’re here
Vibrating like a toy sized dog
Stuck on repeat
In a cassette tape deck
That likes to eat tapes,
I want more
I want the underside of the table
That’s a garbage can
You don’t look into,
I want the sole
Of a soleless shoe,
I want the rattle in my pocket
From change at our corner store
For your mind is the darkness
I’ll stand in the dark for.
Meteor (day 2570)
I watched a meteor fly
Across my lonely sky tonight
A region I have never explored
Beyond my dreams
Amidst mind’s inclusion
A tree upon a root
While eagerly a dog announced
An hour I hadn’t timed
That reached into a back pocket
And pulled out again the sun.
Letters in her Name (day 2360)
Letters in her name were written
Softly in his hand
Two times he wrote them out
One for each their dearest pocket.
– Could it symbolize their path?
Sequestration of thy heart –
To each thy moon
Held, succumb’d to fate
Was at thee other’s
Fulfilling sun.
Though seasons matched,
Callused hands
Caused the ocean
To remain
Disunited.
– Seasoned seas could not forgive
Even as thy beggar holds –
Placed into canals
Where roses floated softly
Sat thoughts burgeoning
As if memory’s remains
Were fertile soil
To plant new clippings
Sitting abreast.
(re)born (day 2307)
This is my process and I’m not ok with it
I’m not swallowing it without a fight
Babbling long lines of dribble down my chin
With my wits left somewhere down the hall I’m not going back
…
Catch up to the statements
And leave some kind of order behind,
Stuffed in a shirt pocket that now sits
Bundled into a non-symmetrical clump.
“This is order?” I scream at the walls,
Figuratively clawing my way to the top of the jar;
Fingernails raw with contempt for sanity,
Chalk lines drawn with my saliva
In spirals that lead to nowhere
And a greasy smear on my chest that has been there
Since the day I was (re)born.
Notes (day 2296)
On the note that I wrote
I said I wasn’t able to grow
It had two long names
I’m not about to repeat
But at the end of the letter
I had two last words
That never came out
Because I had become afraid of you
And then I left unheard
With a broom in my hand
Sweeping up each piece
That shattered as I wept
About the loss of a book
Written two pages at a time
As if it knew it’s turn
And I shall not return
For I have a note in my pocket.
Back Endings (day 2283)
I never wanted to fall apart like this
Leaving pages bent and pencils broken
My back pages are written upside down
And my back pockets are filled with memories
That keep reminding me I’ve gone away.
Rusty backstops echo number five
From a once was now gone away
And we might send a letter
To remind you we’re far from you are home.
I close my eyes and wind lays your whispers
Upon my hardly kempt whiskers
With leaves blowing too early now
For autumn to be upon us,
Yet every breath I hear coming towards me
Leaves traces of my sadness
Rolling along to the tune of the trans-Canada
Like coyotes howling in the night
Reminding me you’re far away.
But I don’t want to say goodnight
I don’t want to wipe the tears
That cool my evening breeze,
I want to take back my endings
I never meant to write down
In a love poem I never meant to send,
No, I want to listen to the stars
Until connection has been made
And my back pockets hold bits of paper
Your pencils wrote to me.
Lines (day 2244)
How many times must my line
Get broken in the sand;
Watched you walk away
Silhouette in the sun.
There I stood without a thought
Three magic coins in my pocket;
Make me lean against a tree
I have no more support.
Gifts of which the bearer has
Left without intention;
I look into a calming pool
Tracing out each line again.
Moon at Midnight – Part XX (day 1994)
(day XIX)
I slipped in to camp quietly
And set the horse loose
Moon Cow was sitting outside his teepee
Waiting for me
And as I sat down next to him
He handed me a blanket
And asked if I had stopped to watch the sunset
I told him it had changed my life
And he nodded silently
Taking a long inhale on his tobacco pipe
And handing it to me.
“What will you do?” he asked
Pointing to the moon
I knew he meant my heart
I fished out my little arrow
From my breast pocket
And told him that everything was already answered
And that I was still staying the winter
If I was still welcome in his home
He said I was always welcome in his teepee
Unless he had a girlfriend
Joking a little bit at the white man’s ways
Then he nodded towards his sister’s teepee
“She is expecting you now.”
I looked and noticed
That Willow was standing with her door open
Firelight dancing along the grass
As she looked straight at me
I walked over holding her gaze.
She held the door open for me
And when I reached her
Stepping to go past
Into the warmth of her teepee for the first time
She reached out her hand
And touched my forearm
To look me in the eyes
Learning the story of my soul
I looked back into hers
And gave her the story of my soul
And I gave her my soul
When she had learned it
I reached out and touched her
And pulled her closer to me
And held her there
For a very long time.
When she looked up
She had tears in her eyes
And said to me:
“I am yours now.”
And I looked her in the eye
And said as clearly as I could,
“Willow, I want to share my life with you
I want to provide for you
I want to protect you
I want to grow stronger with you
I want to bed with you.”
And she smiled her Wild Willow smile
And said again:
“I am yours now.”
And I repeated back to her
“I am yours now, too.”
This time she leaned in to kiss me
And I kissed her back
Until I heard a noise
Coming from inside the teepee
And I looked over
And it was Lily River
Smiling back at us
With her big eyes of joy
We all broke into happy laughter together
And Willow invited me to sit down next to her
On her bedding
And Lily brought us two cups of tea.