Apr 30
poem 8 comments challenge: CJP-COVID19

In My Back Yard

Twin bug bites stain my legs
The spring breeze plays with loose pieces of my hair
And my soul
I don’t know if I like the taste of this tangy lollipop better
Or the the way the orange contrasts against the blue of my tank top
I have to take it out of my mouth to admire this every few minutes
And to relieve my taste buds of its sweet tang.
I'm proud of the way a scrunchy holds my hair almost in place
A little smoother than it used to be.
I let my legs revel in the feel of the air rushing past them
Because they haven’t felt it in months
The sun shines brighter than it did from inside
Trying to solve the mysteries of tangents and parabolas
I love the people I share the sun with
And all I can feel is joy.
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Posted: 04.30.20
Mar 26
poem 0 comments

Asphalt Ballet

One pair of purple sneakers
Jets attached, ready to launch.
One smoothly-paved hill
Asphalt rolling like a solid river runway.
One dreamy
Pastel, spring night
Someone drained the colors from this photograph.
One girl 
Eyes glazed over from staring at a bright, shiny, screen all day
Breathing in the fresh summer air like an icy glass of water.

She is more than ready
Now she is going.

She is sprinting down the hill
Pushing as hard as she can go against gravity
Flying towards the gray mother sky
Who reaches out arms to her, then tugs away
Teasing and daring her
To come farther 
Faster

She is faster than speed.
She is light.

She is flying
It is freedom
It is wind
It is joy

She loves the wind.
Her heart is bubbling up with joy.

It is laughter
It is crazy
It is stomping

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Posted: 03.26.20
Mar 24
poem 5 comments challenge: CJP-COVID19

Leaving home

I wonder about the people who are desperate enough to enter a crowded room
while our governments are telling us not to leave our houses.
Do they need food?
A job too crucial to risk losing?
Is it something that makes our world work the way it does?
Are you the silent cogs that keep this clock turning?
We see pictures online,
on TV,
one woman
head bent, mask surrounding her mouth,
walking quickly across the deserted city.
I don't think she has time to stop and see how beautiful it is,
the silence,
the empty places always filled by bodies.
If it weren't a health concern, I would love to see the world this way
like a movie set,
like you could lean against a wall too hard
and the whole thing would come toppling down.
Are these people like that?
Only thinking of themselves
but not of their health, or the rest of the world?
I don't think so.
I hope they stay safe.
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Posted: 03.24.20
Feb 17
poem 2 comments challenge: Reach

If I could

I play tag with the horizon
And she always wins.
Each time I think I catch her silhouette 
Tracing the mountains and far oceans
-In soft pinks and blues-
She wafts ahead
In fresh mint
And disappearing orange
And I dash after
My small arms not quite reaching
The breadth of my sight.

Someday I will find the edge of the land and the water and the sky
Where earth drops into black matter
And I drop
Into the arms of
Mama Sunlight 
And she will hold me
And I'll hold her
And we will fly together.

For now
I'll run across the landscapes that lead to her
And brush humanity with all my fingertips
And dive deep
Toes first
Into rhythm and movement and sound
And paint life into my soul
With each laughing stroke.

So I'll
keep running 
And keep stretching
If only I could reach
A little farther.


 
 
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Posted: 02.17.20
Jan 24
poem 1 comment

For My Sister, In Her Year Of The Rat

Little sister
You are not little anymore
And to me
You're really more like a twin. 
I have grown with you
And you have grown with me
And you were my first friend
And you are my best
And you are the best.
You are funny
And sometimes loud
But sometimes I am louder.
You are light
And spontaneous starwatching
And you are impatient 
But you hold a kind of patience I could never master.

This year is for you.
It's yours to take
By ancient birthrights.
I made up for one of my frustrating, half-thought-out games
But that doesn't make it any less real
For Harry, it may be inside your head
But you can still reach it, grasp it
And even then reach farther than you ever could imagine.
You are the best kind of weird that ever was
If that's what they want to call it
But I call it
Strong
Unique
Beautiful

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Posted: 01.24.20
Aug 29
poem 0 comments challenge: General

Footsteps

When you
Divide the mile you need to walk
By the number of times you’ll take breath
And move forward that one step
You’ll get a lot
A daunting number that is not
Encouraging you to walk.
But when you divide your mile by a lot
You’ll get that one step
That you need to take to walk.

 
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Posted: 08.29.19
Aug 29
poem 0 comments challenge: General

The Carnival

Is
Stomping rocking rolling brightly colored feathers all together one for all through flight and fall all these people who you don't really know and your friends
Is smelling aromas of food light brightly colored costumes the show is going on and on and on and on forever it seems like but
Finally the fireworks! Your tired souls of feet and spirit lean against each other all the people in that one together mass
Watch the fireworks.
Bright.

Loud.

The colors

Spark your memory

The
Beats and fluid ways of the day all are one, the show, the rhthym, the way we move, together the smells the sights the overstimulation is

The 

Fireworks
(Are beautiful, see them?)

The 
Carnival.
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Posted: 08.29.19
Jul 17
poem 3 comments challenge: General

Summer Girl

Jul 10
poem 2 comments challenge: General

I can't write in a box

I can't write in a box.
Not the big cardboard one waiting to leave with our recycling,
Not the small, ornate, golden tea-box in an antique shop somewhere-or-other
And not the cold metal safe that can travel and appear in every bank at once.
Not any box.
I can't write in a box.

Some boxes my words would overflow
Spilling out the edges and scrambling across the floor.
Some they would feel too small in.
In some they would cluster about each other
Making tight clumps and little knots
They would feel judged
And looked at
By too many molecules of box.
Flammable boxes will not work
My words can be like a ball of fire 
And frozen ice boxes and refridgerators are too cold and unwelcoming.

My letters want to spin themselves into jeweled crowns and beautiful rainbows
My words can weave together and apart
Making shimmering curtains of light
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Posted: 07.10.19

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