Saturday, November 16, 2013

Parents' Nightmare



In the race
to grow up
I was fast.
Spitting out childhood
like spent chewing gum.
The whiskey.
The pain.
The befuddled brain.
Staggering home
in the murky dawn
with razor breath
and lanky dreams.
Mouth full of lies
and silky
half-truths.
Isolated memories,
an archipelago
of shame.

Sunday, November 3, 2013

Puppy Love (wordle # 133)




Ah, the love for small, miraculous creations!
She's so tiny one's impulse is to whisper.
I kneel before her and stare
at each little whisker and claw.
She toddles, bandy-legged
under the sofa, where,
lost and invisible in the shadows,
she emits small whimpers.
Outside, in the infinite grandness,
she follows me
smelling new smells
and licking dew off the leaves.
I see afresh
the beauty of the simple things,
close to the ground.
When she wanders off
I feel the distance between us
and the precarious nature of being,
and being cared for.
A tender balance, not precise.
No bigger than my two fists
her little spark lights my day.

(Infinite, hit, invisible, emits, rhythm, impulse, distance, kneel, creation, whisperings, fists, precise. )