poem a week

For students who have chosen to leave this earth

2010-10-06T21:35:00.003-06:00

   For you
   we stand
   arms out
   reaching grasping
   longing missing
   crying howling
   through holes
   in the air
   where you
   once stood.

   Our hands
   hang empty
   at the ends
   of our arms.

   The piles
   of ideas
   words papers
   maps charts
   essays books
   ink blots
   chalk dust
   false starts
   brave conclusions
   our connections -
   these piles
   tip over
   topple scatter
   pour out
   spill splatter
   bleed and
   we stand
   arms out
   hearts falling
   faces closing
   bones showing
   skins hiding
   knees knocking
   wishing wanting
   reaching grabbing
   for ghosts
   shadowy impulses
   of you.

   Seconds days
   years eons
   click fly
   tumble by
   until finally
   we are able
   to stand
   arms out
   letting you
   go.

Paradoxical Earth

2010-10-05T10:03:00.001-06:00

click click click

The earth moves

in measured paces

across the skies.

It's a predictable march

through time

but the wanton gem

of the universe

defies predictability

as she glides all night

in her shimmery, glimmery

sequined skirts

as she dances her days

swinging and swaying

as she spins through space

her waters foaming

in great swirling wakes

as she trips and trails

through the universe

my beautiful, measured unmeasured

paradoxical woman, Earth.

Drifting-on-air days

2010-09-24T12:37:00.001-06:00

   What landscape is this
   where women float by
   on crisp blue-sky air
   laughing about their past?

   Or is it their laughter
   that is drifting,
   lazily along,
   under the warm autumn sun?

   Either way, the air
   is perfectly warm-cool
   when the women gather
   floating on their laughter

   the way only Colorado
   September-mountain-air days
   can be brilliantly forever sky blue

   the way only golden-orange
   aspen leaves ripple
   and below them
   breezy streams tumble,
   shining all the way down.

   This is the landscape that-
   these are the women who-
   hold me up

   and in me, their glow shimmers
   even after we descend
   from our blue-sky-floating
   drifting-on-air days
   to the everyday lives we lead.

   This is the shimmer
   that holds me up.

Following your hum

2010-09-12T18:24:00.000-06:00

Following your hum

through autumn’s thin air

reminds me

of chasing dragonflies,

longing to see up close

the blues and greens

and golds of their wings.

As you hum bits

of song endings,

float and flit

with a strange fragility,

I long to see through

your translucent skin

to your tiny bones,

long to know

the beginnings of your songs.

Circling: Under the Yellow Sun

2010-09-06T16:41:00.011-06:00

For years

under the black shroud of night,

I have been alone

with my own voice

echoing through the chambers

of my brain.

Night after night

I cling to wakefulness,

do all that I can

to avoid the hulking monsters

of my dreams.

II.

For years

in the warm yellow light of day,

my eyes closed,

I’ve been dozing,

comforted by the blanket

of familiar noises:

my husband cooking

and folding clothes,

my daughters

circling and circling around me

in hopeful spirals.

III.

Sometimes I feel

two girls’ eyes

peering into the place where I reside

and the black birds of their sadness

settle heavily

as one great flock

in my ribs.

I choke on the grief.

And so I fight

to share in their daylight,

pin my lids open

until I can see, finally,

the warm yellow sun

spilling over

their warm yellow hair,

and for a while,

the flock of birds

lifts off my chest

releasing me

from its weight.

IV.

When they’re grown,

I hope they don’t wander in a daze
for too long,

feeling alone and abandoned.

I hope they know

the electricity of the yellow sun,

the safety and softness of night,
and so I fight my way back

through the tunnel

of backward nights and days,

to join them,

to circle and circle in dizzy spirals,

loving them so much

under the yellow sun.