PENELOPE WAITS

The mirror of wrinkles
And bending form,
The smoke of graying hair
Startle the years
And race them closer to
Their end.
What will be left to her
But what the feeble have:
A weakened mind and
Woeful eyes--bewilderment?
Confusion assails these interim years
As composure and creation reel into
A crevasse, the rumored
Drowning vortex--
As life becoms uncharted,
Spinning mercilessly between the
Tumultuous swirling
And the rocks on the shore
That can no longer
Be trusted...

But then the reader considers,
Raising her eyes from the text:
"They also serve who stand and wait."

Harmony, Two Cats, Two Vases

 

Harmony sang a balm

For sins however adolescently

Committed as orange light bathed a room.

It sang of my green eyes—I’m sure that’s why

You loved that song, but the light

Extinguished;

Enchantment fled.  Was my hair not

Golden enough?  You didn’t want

To share two cats in the yard

That we would call 

 Ours? Would life

Have been so

Hard?  No

Pentagrams

I drew ever

Brought

You

Back

To

Me

(except for just one minute).

 

The flowers wilted in the vase

Yesterday,

But I bought a new one today.

 

 

15 August 2012

 

 

 

 



The Black Friday Before Christmas

 

I woke up at 5:00,

hopped up out of bed:

Most unlike me, I admit...

always loll an hour instead...

jumped into my jeans, 

my black shirt and shawl--

then upset my style

with white tennies for the mall.

No time for coffee:  Diet Coke had to do--

along with the tranq, so no problems would ensue...

hopped into the car with daughter at the wheel:

Her coupons and plans were making her reel:

"Where's Kohl's?" she inquired.

"I don't know," I replied.

"You live here; I don't," she came back,

so I thought and I tried

to picture the store where I'd just seen it last,

and, lo and behold, the great Kohl's had held fast

on Loop 12 at Skillman--with Target next door;

nothing could be easier when shopping for more.

The crowd: It was lulling post the madness of 3:00.

Most were at coffee or a donut reprieve.

We bought toys galore--and I want to keep them,

but I'll wrap them up brightly

With bows meant to hide them:

A Pink V-Dub with Barbie and trucks that make noise,

pajamas and books for the girls and the boys,

DVDs for my Laura, a little something for my man.

When I realized I'd had all the fun I could stand,

we came home for breakfast with

hot chocolate to mend--

and to top it all off, a little whipped cream!

Laura has recharged,

and I sit here and wonder, "Was all that a dream?"

Now she's whisked off

to shop with her cousin and aunt,

but I'm opting to sit with the fire, dogs, and cat.

 

26 November 2010

A Hero Rides Away

A choreography of a higher power,
A documentary of love, will remain in the blinded minds
And heavy hearts—a mystery
Of falling golden leaves, twirling through blue omnipotence
Down to the earth to rest at the limited feet
Which later trudge to watch the fallen hero
Lie still at last—after he takes his final ride.
Tears streak and imprison stricken faces
Yet liberate for a while the pent-up
Anguish felt not only for today’s hero
But for the heroes gone away during
Their yesterdays.
Accumulation of love and fear and
Misunderstanding and acceptance
And loss bind neighbors and strangers
As one with just a glimpse of Heaven
As they try to save the moment
Yet wish they could forget this elimination,
Forget this presence of tragedy.
Young men with faces dappling red cry and
Struggle with carrying
The weight of one who will never hold
Such gravity in their lives again.
They become little boys again:
With such metamorphoses, why cannot they also summon their hero
To ride next to them again
Rather than be borne by the amassed strength
That they have gained under his guidance?
The blue and golden day bears
The sorrowful and laden hearts for the wife, the neighbors, the strangers,
The mothers, the fathers, the sisters, the brothers,
The sons, the daughters—and those boys— who
Cannot bear to carry them with their
Own endurance because knowledge of
How to endure escapes them.
Yet they do not need command of this mystery today:
The beautiful day holds and caresses them
As it sways them in the cradle of
The lightness of the breeze
Which causes the leaves to fall.

9 November 2012

Water

Aquaceous

loquacious--
Were it intubatious
I could breathe it--
In water I can fly--
the only place I can fly--
except in my dreams where
through the air I can fly.
Water and air I wish could be one.

eternity

in the far and dark

reaches of the night

the little girl pondered

how in the world

(Heaven, actually)

she would keep herself

occupied for eternity

after the demise...

all she could come up with

was to eat popcorn at the movies

 

cypress aflame

lake mirrors

coots float in blue sky

Aquarius, We Hope

We dawned the age of Aquarius

back in 1969.

Some never heard the words

which blast away still today

and bounce back and forth,

ricocheting around the interior of

a New Beetle--from an iPod.

No one outside can

hear it but me. The others on

the freeway absorb their own messages

from their own programs.

How cacophonous we've become.

What did cacophony ever serve

except to warn us in a movie that

something bad was about to happen?

But we pound on down the highway
as if ZZ Top were dying tomorrow.
 

And yet I remember a herald of

cacophonous cathedral bells

which scattered doves to flight.

Aquarius, we hope.

Berries

 

The berries of a time ago

bleed into memory

as onto my tongue and

onto my hands then.

The yellow-jackets: 

They hovered then

a moment—then

whisked to the other side

of my head until

I wished them away--

like the thoughts of

my days today.

 

Where do thoughts go for

someone who does not

hold them still? They arise as a

taste or a hue again—

as an aroma

that elicits warmth or pain.

Remembered bright days of childhood accompany

visions that sear and splash

the rows of berries

in a refrigerated market and strings of beans

haphazardly bulked in piles,

not harvested by

children whose sun-heated

thoughts transcend to what might

be grown

on another day

far-flung from the circles of

their imaginations—

circles which do not close

as they are pricked

by years of circumventing

to regain the serenity

and yearning of a child.

 

Nov. 18, 2009

Thin Morning Air

 

Thin morning air,

lemon-colored light,

Helios’ delight:

Stellar gray of dawn

takes wing with geese

who trumpet the day.

Breezes shiver leaves,

aroused for diurnal play 

of shading mortals

from the fierceness

of his reign.

Yet Apollo’s light filters through

with dapples of truth.

We dare not know omniscience.

Blinded we continue,

passing from nocturnal songs

to the burnishing of dirges—

wondering which way the

wind will spin us into

webs thrown out merely,

yet with no little weight; we

knock on wood,

cross our fingers,

cross our hearts,

sing praises to the heights,

and wait for all surprises

lingering in the air—

set to stagger or amaze us,

to take the wind or

fill our sails.

We tremble and pause

to catch our breaths.

31 May 2011

To a Scholar

To a Scholar

I take no credit.

I am a small bit of mortar

in the edifice that becomes your

living.  Our roads cross

briefly, but your

journey is lengthy.

I am but a sign post.

I am not the path.

You fly.  You sing.  You

work.  You play well.  You

become an aria as your own influence

mingles with the gladness of a choir of strong elders.

Indubitably, you

are more than the sum

of all the intermittent notes that balance you

and that you count

for brief moments--

more than all the arcs that spring

you to spiral

upward and forward

to countless blessed hours.

The long-lived measures

you learn to improvise

after understanding the rules of school--

and I am humbled
and carried forth

by the delivery

of your song.

8 June 2011, edited 28 August 2012

The Umbra

Fear is the umbra that I carry

From my youth.

It snakes its way coldly

Through the years—

As shards of ice shooting

Through my veins,

Stabbing my heart,

Compelling me to falter—then halt.

Hence, the steam from the bleeding-out

Infects me with cold sweat in the night—

When all reason is obscured.

Yet I cling to this shadow

Which cannot leave me

(for a shadow is not a variable),

Seeking its companionship

Rather than enmity--

As a Lost Boy who delights

In the tests of his bravery,

However spectrally

They are presented

(for Hope is the small thing

that thrives in the darkness

of Pandora's box).

Herein lies the key to surviving:

To open one’s eyes as

Innocently as a child

Each morning

As Dawn slips in through

The window to 

Emblazon her light on the face

Of fear—

Hence blinding the serpent

Which would tempt and deceive

With the image of safety 

Hidden underneath

The dark covers of the bed--

Urging one to live in limbo forever.

10 June 2011

Agley: From Dictionary.com, Word of the Day

a·gley

   [uh-glee, uh-gley, uh-glahy]  Show IPA

adverb Chiefly Scot.

off the right line; awry; wrong.

Big Lennie loved the mouse a wee

Bit hard.  He begged for rabbits, too.

But George--he knew that she--

Whom the big child crushed (though nameless She may be)--

Foreshadowed all their schemes--agley…

The rabbits in the sky he watched…

The rabbits in the sky:

He had no prospects more to fear

And no more stakes unmade.

Mice and men are fragile beasts,

And so’s a woman without a name.

6 April 2012

dog day musings

still August but a bit of

fall is springing in the air

during seconds in the

shade by St. Augustine

which survives in any heat

…hope…there’s hope…

my new year always begins

in the fourth quarter

…listen for the marching band’s

practice tomorrow morning

…I forget this every year

until surprise smacks me

after the drought and channels more words

buzzing in the left brain

waiting for a nudge from the right

brain while dodging squadrons

of giant dragonflies that the

aerial spray didn’t kill

…happy they’re alive

…not the graceful lacey ones

…hordes of them like black ops 'copters

…perhaps the strongest to survive or

perhaps ones strengthened by the poison somehow—

bizarrely, like the green grass that grew one

August in Hiroshima

…still, there’s hope

…a Mayberry day

…walking the chihuahua who’d

love to chew away the leash

and make me work for this walk

…a Mayfield day

…even the tree trimmer’s red rig

like old Gus’s fire truck

…transcendence to a time

before the towers came down

to a time which needed no towers

…or so I think…

23 August 2012

Sing

The panther screams, yet again, within the womb;

His mother’s golden eyes search the shadows

Of the night for the poacher:  No trickery

Of the gods on Olympus here:

Innocence no longer tempts them:  Paranoia and evil

Cloak and arm themselves into incarnate forces without

The aid of a sanctified force…no thoughts of “meant to be”

Can be condoned:

Evil happens when evil is allowed when heads turn the other way.

The words of poets, the canvases of artists,

The songs of chanteuses:  These are our strongest prayers—

Besides the mother’s wail and the father’s jousting with the night.

The poets, the artists, the singers absorb the ricochet of every bullet

In their souls when the fabric of the universe is rent once again.

They cannot sleep until they weave more cloaks against the

Coming of the phantoms of fear.

So, “Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story

Of that man skilled in all ways of contending…”
 

Where are our heroes?
They are within.

24 March 2012

The City Sings a Song of Jazz

The city sings a song of jazz

with softened saxes and gentle guitars

to send us gliding around the curves

of overpasses brunted against the

neon skyline as the moon rises and ripples

among high frozen notes of clouds

as the sun plays its final reprise

on the shaded eyes of skyscrapers

while the users of the streets

play musical chairs--

as some exit, others arrive--

while many can only march in place.

The jazz once sang for a swinging happening

at a fancy club where memories of jet-setters are left

as ring stains on bars and tables.  The fog of

martini-laden nights croons to us--who were too

young to be glamourous then.

The underbelly of the city cannot quieten

the soulful scats of the lounge singer's echo

from decade to decade,

cannot hide the burlesque

that flowed heavily and rounded, carrying the good and the bad on its River Styx,

cannot stop the resonance of bullets near a grassy knoll,

cannot stop the carousel's fillies from going 'round and 'round.

We stalk the years

that played all the standards--and set the standards

up and down the scales of every dweller's heart--

and we lean wistfully on lamposts,

wishing for a film noir's moment

with a saxophone's rising.

26 September 2011