Poetry
The Moments Following Disaster
A rough, uneven concrete imprints the bottom of my feet
Shoes not even a thought
Eerie silence combined with frightened chatter
Midnight black sky with a tainted green hue
The smell of wet, mildew grass and fuming gas fusing together
Stronger in parts of the breathing street that will hold this memory
A herd marching in my heart
Cold shiver
A wire through my body
Electric like the yellow porch lights
Collapsed homes clone my own
Fallen tree trunks block the endless road
Red and white flashes send shocks to my eyes
Piercing sirens mimicking bells in my ears
Reminding me of how I used to think
“This would never happen to me.”
To The Mother That Left Her Mouth Open On Sunday
Did the burning throat hurt less if it came from alcohol?
Or the lies sold like lemonade at garage sales
Was the taste of charred rubber and lemon skins
Bitter? Or was it sweet like candy
Lime and salt held to your lips
Like sandpaper on my cheek
Did the yellowed skin finally match your drink?
Like forbidden camouflage
Did the abandonment fill the space
And time between liquor store binges?
I begged you to take me shopping,
the smell of mint and cinnamon
covered the vinegar coated breath,
but I told you not to go shopping sober
when your aggression was stronger
than the taste of gasoline
August is All You’re Allowed
It’s a log cabin I hole myself
up in Thoreau-style, my only neighbors
the pines, cedars, the black walnuts
littering the floor with their dense body
musty, bittersweet, thick
NPR calls it the un-walnut and
the black birds agree, knocking
the fat fruit from the canopy
embodying how thump is sounded out
by the mouth, tha-ump, tha-ump
it sinks through
the air like the winged
seed of a maple – samaras –
they’re called, the word a gob of honey
slinking down the lip
of a mug, samaras, samaras, they evolved
to fly, to carry their seeds to sunnier more
hospitable places, to keep tucked in, tucked
away, tucked beneath the brush
where the white dotted fawns
lay spindle under spindle leg, quiet and
waiting. When you spot them, you stop.
You hold your breath.
You move on.
A Mirror Framed with Flowers
I look in the mirror and I finally see it
The grief on her face
Her arms wrapped around her waist
Keeping her organs from spilling and spewing out of her skin
Her cheeks wet with tears that burn like spilled
coffee and car crashes and oxygen tanks
her mouth is open in a soundless cry
that only the birds can understand
when their tune shifts to a minor key
they peck at her ears like rain drops on a roof
their wings dancing as they flutter away in fear
when her knees drop to the floor
I also understand her
I feel comfort in her grief
I reach for her, caressing a warbling mirror
This also comforts me
The bendable nature of reflection
Flight 1649
My sister and I split the last of the anti-anxiety gummies
on the way to the airport
They taste like cheap lip gloss
And the familiar bittersweetness of endings
38 minutes to Midway
The further we drive the more I feel like a
rubber band
One end fixated at my grandma’s little house
The more distance covered only means
the harder I’ll snap back on return
The force of impact will break my bones
15 minutes to Midway
We said we’d get lunch at the airport
We both know we won’t be hungry
maybe we’ll pay $15 for a pack of crackers
My shoulder is still stiff from sharing the guest bed
I imagine my whole arm snapping off when lifting my suitcase
7 minutes to Midway
I hand my sister one of my AirPods
As she takes it I feel
The isolation that steps on my heart like a brake pedal
Ease up
Creep back
I feel her rubber band stretch too
One Bedroom Apartment
I remember that one bedroom apartment
how the light cut through the carpet
lifetime supply of shadows just dancing through the kitchen window
in the evenings, afternoons in the winter
Second story, first love story
groceries in both hands
butterfingers and cracking knees
Do you remember?
The way we lived life to make or hope to forget
the things we swore or said in whispered words
crack a smile, laugh a little
you gotta take it one minute a mile at a time
it’s all we’ve got and all we had
precious progress up and down hills with loose gravel
I remember that one bedroom apartment
the feeling of walking through it the first time with you
the smell of freshly washed carpet
The emptiness when we finally last locked it
