(google image)
I get a hollow brain sensation
when I’m overwhelmed
Like my brain is porous
and anything can fly in or out
It’s an unsettling feeling, to be sure
Feeling unmoored
unglued
poem
Serenity (of The Smug)
(google image)
Serenity of The Smug
the breezy manner
that accompanies
Good Fortune
The knowing smile,
shared,
that says, “We have it all.”
(and you don’t.)
Untouchable
No surprises
Dark deeds
easily erased
Oh, it’s good to be us.
Such security
of the mind
Protection
of the body
Absence
of heart
We don’t abide
The have-nots
It’s their fault, anyway.
They didn’t work hard
enough
They are lazy
They don’t come from
good stock
We deserve everything
we have
God has smiled upon us
We are blessed
And you are f**ked
Shadow Self
(google image)
It’s all the bright I cannot see
when it’s right in front of me
Shadow Self
Bursts of light make it through
in spite of themselves
like a fragile shoot birthing through
the crack of a New York City sidewalk
The will to live
Remains
only altered, and strange
beautiful in a different way
Shadow Self
Survived Christmas
(google image)
No Christmas movies on TV this year
Caught “Bad Santa” on Netflix, though.
Enforced jubilation wears on the soul
inside I’m screaming, “No more!”
Wish I had a new brain
free of the pain
no trauma
to re-live
helpless, out of control
I sincerely wish you all “Merry Christmas”
and a “Happy New Year”
though I can’t wait for it
to go
Don’t expect me to smile
though I know how to laugh
Surviving the Ghosts of Christmas
Present and Past
I Carry His Heart
Halloween was Lorin’s favorite holiday. He loved getting dressed up and greeting the neighborhood kids.
If Halloween fell on a weekend, we would get more inventive with our costumes since we weren’t getting home late from work.
On one such Halloween, Lorin dressed up as a hillbilly zombie or was it a “redneck” zombie? He was excellent with makeup from his years studying and working in the theater. He wore a torn flannel shirt, suspenders, old pants, hiking boots and carried a mixing bowl with blood (red food dye colored water) and eyeballs (fake, of course). He stirred the bowl with a wooden spoon while sitting on the stoop. He scared some kids, but one actually asked for an eyeball, much to his mother’s chagrin.
I dressed up as the “joker’s wife” (Heath Ledger’s Joker) in a housedress, torn knee-high stockings, big slippers, matted hair in a hairnet with rubber spiders in it, and white face paint with a jagged red smile.
We were quite the pair.
A neighbor took a photo of us, but I can’t find it.
I will miss Lorin at Halloween, as I do every holiday, and every day.
This poem is dedicated to him. I almost had my best friend read it at his memorial service, but I changed my mind. I would have preferred to have read it myself, but I wasn’t fit to do so.
i carry your heart with me
(by e.e. cummings)
i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you
here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)
Zombie-Voodoo Dream
(google image, Night of the Living Dead, 1968)
A shadowy figure
coal dust-covered zombie in rags
followed me everywhere
reaching out his rotting finger
trying to touch me
I went into a hotel
telling them he would not leave me alone,
not to let him in
He got in anyway
I said, “What do you want from me?”
making a cross with two fingers in front of my face
as if that would ward him away
He didn’t speak
“I curse you,” I said.
I know he was trying to curse me
I woke up, ready to do battle
with the zombie voodoo brigade
Powder
(google image)
Earth, moist from an earlier rainfall
impression of a body on the ground
where he lay
powder pink blanket with blue stripes
like a baby’s blanket
too short for an adult
I wanted to keep it
but it was taken from me
like everything else
that day
ground into dust
I am powder
no longer whole
only particles of myself
remain
I don’t recognize who I am
Let Me Breathe
(google image)
Pulling myself out of the earth
grasping at crumbling bits of clay
choking on each bit as it slips
through my fingers and
into my mouth
Let me breathe
two steps forward
three steps back
Let me breathe
Your opinions are not welcome
a listening ear will do
Have you been living in the dirt
with me?
have you seen your husband die
alongside I-95?
then shut up
and let me be
Let me breathe
I Am the Widow
(google image)
I am the thing that keeps you up at night
I am the thing that makes me sick
I am the elephant in the room
I am the widow not wearing black
I am the hands tied behind my back
Certain things are expected of me
I try to keep up appearances
the world is watching
ever watching
I am the one who dirties your dreams
I am the guilty Sophie’s Choice survivor
I didn’t ask to live
Who chose me?
I am the one you can pity
and despise
for not being who you want me to be
I am angry, angry, angry
wanting to tear off my own skin
I am not the Merry Widow
I am not the ever-mourning one either
I am not made of wax
but I burn
I want you to understand
but I don’t think you can
Rage at the Machine
(google image)
No one to blame
so let’s blame the machine
the machine that drove us to his death
the black Ford Explorer with champagne trim,
like Stephen King’s Christine
or we can blame lack of sleep
we both fell asleep–
not a Viking death
as Lorin had hoped for
death be not proud*
I am not proud
I am deeply depressed
I want to get over it
but I can’t seem to
so I’m trying to get through it
every day
but the days are long
and they don’t make sense
Let’s blame the machine,
the inanimate object,
not the humans who
controlled it
and lost control of it
the lives lost
the heartbreak
blame the machine
*Death, be not proud (John Donne)
Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,
Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones, and soul’s delivery.
Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well
And better than thy stroke; why swell’st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally
And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.
Suburban Hobo 