"My mom forgot to put me a jacket"
Interrupts my thoughts of a poem about a poncho
Wrapping a girl in plaid
A me long past, my dream turning over in my head
as a possible place to discuss my aging
This is interrupted by "Mrs Puglisi, Mrs. Puglisi
May I play with the blocks?"
Which entails my pulling out the boxes
It is too cold to send these children out.

Reset

Pigeon

Iridescent form
Held captive in winter's wind-
Startles me driving.


Mother

Coffee spills, dirty
Trails in a worn life carpet-
Wiping my two feet.


Me

Green stuffed chair holds me
Rose garden afghan covers you-
winter regression.


Thoughts

Daylight reveals dust
Particles moving-light beam
Through a midnight dawn.


Your Amends

NO TIME NO HEART NO
WORDS NO EXPLANATIONS NO
COMMUNICATION


My Son

17 pounds, night sweats
Anxiety and nausea-
Scars on mom's conscious


Ennui

Empty of feeling
Boredom ticks, reality show-
Magnifies distance.


Conversation

Switch places said words
Assume another's position
Exchange meaning



Promises

No poem for sarah
Your letters were never written-
Being a Haiku.

Valentines

Two very famous people announce they are going to divorce
Neither can name a reason
"There just isn't any one reason."
Friends and press are shocked because
Theirs was a fairytale, or at the least
A lot of affection was liberally displayed.

There are a few rumors in gossip mags about
His temper.

In another world
A note calmly tells me that his
Ordeals now dealt him another sadness
And a move into some kind of divorce counseling
But when I ask
Nothing is answered

Then I lost my voice and the will to ask again.

I've been looking up more often
For the sudden descent of the reasonless divorce
Trying to prepare myself when the press comes around
No, I'm kidding
Its hard to explain the feeling of this time in life
So many promises and so many brokenfriends
Seeing them shopping for the next one
The one.


Love

Small thoughts

 

Victimless Crime

It was sunny
I was escaping a workday
on the way
Home
Winds were ice blades
Let me tell it.

One reality moving in another

There was the car,
It was warm inside, my
Mind on groceries, you know?
And this breaks into that.
Time, right lane turn coming,
Radio turned to NPR talk,

Pushing the car frame, whipping
Winds were so intent
Then by the left window
Suspended
the force held a captive
Iridescent color, green, grey, turquiose
A shape caught my eye

I saw a fan of feathers

The car was traveling 45 miles an hour
So I pulled my head back
Broke and impotently pulled right
Color and form would have crashed into the glass
 to die
At the level of my
Wandering  mind

The wind saved her, held her, gathered her invisibly
This pigeon
Defying gravity right in my line of vision,
a magic act
It was such a relief, frankly

A pigeon.
The one thing today I didn't
Regret 
Or carry along into the night
When I yelled and said

Terrible things.





Di.vid.ed Thoughts from a Teach.er Train.ing

My house now
Is one di.vi.ded
Open and clos.ed syl.la.bles
It stands on a crum.bl.ing foun.da.tion
Of want

All this time
To see that
Long vo.wels and short
My pri.ma.ry
Prob.lem
Is in the parts and rules

It can.not stand
Un.til I let it go
La.tin and Greek roots
Of need.ing to be
Seen
And un.der.stood
Past part.i.cip.les.


The Thinker

Her little head was bobbing
to the left  right, up down
Visualizing multiplying three numbers times one
Something shown to her just moments before,
She immediately wanted to do it, in her mind
And beat the kid beside her trying to cheat with a calculator
In the advanced third grade after school group


The beauty of it
Was catching her in the act of visualizing, to see her
The rapid incorporation of a new rule
Folded into her mathematical reasoning
"It's 248, 248, isn't is?"
It was 248 when worked out the long way
On a paper, she'd just flown there mentally.

How did you know? a teacher inquiry,
Her smile was infectious, with a giggle.
"I do it, " she sighed, "In here."
So she does, tapping that head
With the new crocheted cap in pinks
Dancing on one foot
Chomping her cheesy corn.



Immortal

It isn't unique
It drives us all
No doubt.
No doubt.

This ring
was given to me
By your Aunt Mary
I said it was beautiful
She said,
Here take it.

This is the story
Of my childhood
These were the things
That hurt,
Or the days when
I carelessly kicked a ball
Down a hill.
My first realization I could do bad things,

Here is the street I was
Born on.
Or the school that once was
Segregated
I was
Taught here.

That house on Maple
Freda lived there
Remember the cookies
We make
Every Christmas
I know you know
You made them for me-
Her's.

Come to think of it
I drew
That picture from
The zinnas Dad
Grew for me
His were
Extrodinary

When I went
To New York
With peter
I kept that tiny clown
Puzzle
From Coney Island.

That bracelet
Was
Right after the hysterectomy
It was on sale
100 dollars
I was out driving
First time in nine weeks
Fainted

For him
I wrapped up everything
my heart
Wrote it
on tissue
So he could
Not have time

The search for
that audience
the love
for the father to sit with an arm
Around me
Has never
Worked.

It's just a need I couldn't supply myself.