I can’t recall if it was so gradual I didn’t notice, or all at once, like I suffered some kind of emotional trauma, but the pines catching snow on their needles reminds me of when I found my whiskers had begun going white. I can’t say it bothered me all that much, not like when my hair turned from salt and pepper to a pilar NaCl without the spice and from there to a skinny low-sodium diet from my ears up. But nature certainly has a way of letting one know Winter’s coming, whether a guy's looking at a pine tree in November's falling snow or his face in the mirror on the weekend. By the way, pilar is an adjective meaning “of or related to hair.” I chose it instead of hirsutal because it was less work changing one letter from one of those Doric columns lining the fronts of old public buildings, rather than a whole mess of spell-checked letters in that swishy thing attached to the ass end of a cowboy’s mount. Which, come to think of it, is a pretty hirsutal thing, too.
poetry
Just a Pile of Words
To you I might be just a pile of words that probably doesn’t say much, a voice that makes no sound, a silence that roars truth if I’m doing this right, At least that’s what I hope you found. One day I might get through to myself with the message I’ve much too long been missin’. But in truth I’m like you, to whom this truth can’t get through if to my own truth I don’t first listen.
Being Human In the Headlights
Wednesday morning, the big doe stepped from the brush girding the stand of pines on the north side of the yard. She was a majestic dream of a deer. Grandest female I’ve ever seen, even hiding her beauty beneath that late autumn coat. Idling halfway across the yard, she stopped, brown eyes looking into mine as I froze in the kitchen window. This dull grey human in the headlights. I broke the connection, blinking loud enough I spooked her. Who am I kidding? She stopped to spook me. How she knew I was intently eyeballing her is probably the same superpower you have when I stare at you, even standing there in my imagination. You just know. So, just like that, soon as she knew I’d been whipped, she trotted the rest of the way into the southside shadows, disappearing with a shake of her tail and three four-beat cloppities of her hooves. And now you’re both shrouded in my forest, your own stand of memory within me. I hope you’ll come back around and see me, even in your dun autumn coat, still shining as grand as you really are. I promise this time I won’t blink.
Once I Was A Sky-Gazer
I used to notice so much in the sky, airliners writing travelogues in white contrail ink, birds penning songs in feathered bunting strung tree to tree, castles and dragons and here and there your face sculpted in billowing vapor, even the poorly cleaned blackboard ceiling upon which crows would scratch their calls. After sundown I’d watch the winter moon rise working hard to escape from the net of limbs the maples tossed skyward to no avail, watch the escapee glide behind windblown clouds, follow stars as they ran their courses as if the gods were twisting the dial on the firmament, and wonder if I was hearing the invisible vee calling the cadence as it sky-marched from Canada to the Chesapeake. I don’t sense so much anymore as I wander alone beneath that world flying above since my neck doesn’t bend back far enough to scan the great dome covering 360 degrees of horizontal wonder. But over there an empty bag of chips is chasing a squirrel up that oak, at dawn the neighborhood windows glow like apricots or 65-inch rainbows, and then there’s this flat me-shaped guy who tripped me the other day when he caught me while I tried sky-gazing again.
Brava
Who would hear it, if I was to fall now that no one listens anymore? Would you feel the air rush past my ears as I drop on my way to the cold, hard floor, where my last breath will be cruelly knocked from my chest with a whoosh or a rasp? Would my life playing on the screen in your mind in nano-second episodes make you gasp? Might your attention leave the theater after the .002-second scene of the third act because even my gun, the one from Act One, going off in my head couldn't make you react? Or perhaps you’d wait stage-left to see if my final thought was of you alone, as in the overture and between the lines I’ve written, recited and probably blown. Until the curtain falls and in the wings I'll wait for you to make your final bow and adieu and join me there because some writer never amended his script to ever let me join you.
Trying For a Mountain When a Molehill Will Do
I’m sitting at my window watching a mountain being born upon the swatch of ground between me and the shed. Something out there wiggled, distracting my eye from this sheet of white, which lies as flat and dormant as my inspiration and the near-frozen ground from which -obviously - mountains can happen. Again it shakes and an eruption of fresh earth spews forth, cascading down its conical form like I wish great words would from my pointy head. And I spit curses at myself and Nature because there She goes making perfect molehills again while I’m stuck trying to make mountains. True happening. Too true failing.
Hold On, Hold On
I wish I had a life something like yours, as sad as you feel you are. Yes, it’s dealt you some busted hands, here and there…even there…a scar. But at least you’ve lived and loved and felt, the sense that’s left me just old. And now I’m seeing that light up ahead, where the only touch I’ll feel is cold. Looks like I’ll always be left to wonder what my life would’ve been like if only… Wondering doesn’t feel so soft and warm, wondering like this only feels lonely. Too late now to hope some day I’ll find what I’ve not often felt to feel better. Your memories hold the warmth you’ve held, and I pray someday we can hold some together.
Telling You A Lot Since I’ve Nothing to Say
The words won’t come to me today, at least ones that make any sense. Forgotten their rules, too, that is to say, except, perhaps, number and tense. But what do I know? I’m just a man, who daily hooks his heart to his sleeve and hopes what he says you’ll understand and keep you near and never leave. But I’ve no control over what you feel, only Hope and Faith I might give you pleasure. I pray a little of your heart I can heal, or maybe steal, what I regard as a great treasure. I’ve rattled on here much too long, especially for someone with nothing to say. With Faith and Hope I’ll send this along, but (again) looks like I’m sending my Love today. This truly started out as a free write this afternoon. Couldn’t get any words to knit together, so I just wrote what came to me when I wasn’t trying.
As New As This, As Old As That
It’s special, this time, as my life dwindles down. I look back at what I can remember of the days and nights that led me to this place and time. But I can’t remember as much as I’d wish, those experiences as much a mystery to me as who wrote the good stuff in these books with my name on them. Or who I was to the world, or to you. I don’t envy those with memories of each little thing most find important. It’d be stupid to envy that which I cannot hold, and, in truth, never did. I do envy those who got to, though I pray that’ll slip away, too. But this time’s special, indeed, because you’re now like a new discovery to my eager, raw and just-learning mind. And that, dear one, is a gift just behind this life and your love to me. Because I got a late start (Let’s admit it, I forgot about it), I combined a batch of Writer’s Digest poem-a-day challenge prompts in this Sunday catch-up special. In fact, one of them is a Special poem. I also tied together two title prompts, the “As (Blank)" and the "(Blank) That” prompts. Finally, I made this one of my Memory poems and threw Raw in there just to complete the handful.
Dumb Luck and the Blame Game
I wonder why so many of us choose to shoulder blame when kismet drew the card. And even when pointed out, we refuse to accept our life’s hard just ‘cause it’s hard. I used to say I must’ve been the one when something inevitably went wrong. Everyone else looked like they had won -- or at least at the sky -- whistling a song. But after too many times taking blame, from parents, teachers, friends for all this stuff, I realized they couldn’t deal with the shame to admit their fault. So I said “Enough!” I’m not responsible for your screwups, and perhaps they’re not all your fault, as well. Sometimes stuff happens, like dice rolled from cups and taking on unearned blame’s a living hell. Life’s a gamble, randomly dealt, lost and won and sometimes things happen ‘cause they do. If you can’t accept this then Life won’t be fun. And while I hate blame, that one’ll be on you.
A Thing for Words 