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.