Midnight black and midday grey
paints a tapestry of melody
across evergreen-scraped cloudscapes
that sing ghostly choruses heard only
by old creaking bones elongating
upon currents whisking between
whispers unseen but felt where
few dare to dwell in disrepair.
The horizon, a hollow,
imaginary point of dim light,
nature’s slight-of-hand sight trick,
a fixated point unfixed
in space and time on spatial waypoints
that can never be affixed,
beckons for resolutions that
will never come but come what may,
at least I can say, I was on my way.
***
I’m not sharing mine over there this time because… well… if you’ve been following this blog, you already know damn well I’m not supposed to be doing prompts right now. But some of the prompts, like this one, are so tempting that I can’t help myself. I may need a poetry intervention so I can go work on the poetry I’m supposed to be working on.
Still, I know I said I would stay away from the prompts for a while, but I met my project goals today, so I deserve to play with words for a bit.
Wifey made tuna salad today and offered me some. I gratefully heaped a pile of it into a cereal bowl, but stopped short of eating. It was missing something. I diced up two hardboiled eggs and mixed them with the tuna salad. Much better, but it was still missing something. I sprinkled paprika onto the dish and tasted it. It was good, but one more thing was missing; Ritz crackers. Sadly, we were out of Ritz, so multigrain gourmet cracker nonsense had to do. I tasted, and was transplanted back to Chicago housing projects during the many times momma made this special snack for me.
grayer than most light
noon sky, counterfeit silver
I pocket the fee
Minus the Ritz, I had inadvertently made momma’s special way of making tuna salad, which on the surface, was probably unremarkable to most. But it was the one meal she made where I didn’t feel like a poor person while eating it. I could imagine all wage brackets having a tuna salad craving, and I imagined people from all walks of life savoring this delicacy in some fashion. It felt good to be on some kind of universal level with wealthy ones who enjoyed tuna salad occasionally.
clouds hide sky-scrapers
visibility is poor
to what lies beneath
I had always known I was poor, but it wasn’t a big deal because everyone I knew was also poor. We lived the same struggles, went to the same government check-cashing places, shopped at the same discount stores, ate the same public school free lunches, wore the same knockoff-brand clothing, and feared the same criminal element and/or corrupt, racist police shakedowns. I didn’t experience any stigma or shame for being poor until I began being bussed to the magnet school Beasley Academic Center. I have nothing against the school, as it was an expansive learning opportunity, but it was perfectly apparent to me that I was one of the poorer kids in attendance. Many kids were from stable, successful 80’s Cosby-sitcom-style homes. They wore Guess jeans, Genera button-ups, Nike, Adidas, Reebok, BK’s, you name it, and they always had the latest technological marvels like Walkmans, mini-synthesizers and etc…
rain bathed in streetlight
amber-hued menagerie
all will be covered
I recall being teased for many things; being shy (back then, nobody mentioned introverts as otherwise normal folks content to keep to themselves; we were “shy” kids who needed to be “fixed” so we would be more social like a “normal” kid), being a nerd (back at regular school, being a nerd just meant that I was smarter than the average sixth-grader or had greater intellectual curiosity than most; being a nerd at the magnet school – where I was rendered intellectually average due to all the other “gifted” kids being bussed in – just meant that I was the funny-looking kid with the coke-bottle glasses), and being rather unfriendly and all too eager to throw hands for someone so tiny, shy, and nerdlike (if all you wanted was to be left alone, but others kept screwing with you, I suspect you would develop a chip on your shoulder as well).
But for all the random teasing, nothing left me as defenseless as being teased for bring poor. Being a shy nerd who fought a lot was in my DNA, and I owned all of that, but I had nothing to do with being born poor. I had no say in it. Those were cards I had been dealt.
sunshine reveals you
true colors rich, emboldened
the shade, deeper still
The hilarious part was that after three consecutive days of being teased, bullied, getting fed up and fighting back, and ultimately, losing said fights in overwhelmingly one-sided fashion, a teacher decided to counsel me. She wanted to “crack my shell” and find out why I was always so angry and depressed. She wanted to know what in my home life could possibly make me so enraged and isolated. It had to be something at home, right? Perhaps my mother was abusing me, or had boyfriends with boundary issues.
I never opened up, partially because at the time – though an undiagnosed schizophrenic initially losing her grip on reality – mom was the best thing going for me and I didn’t want any outsiders screwing that up by revealing her secret. Also, I never opened up, partially because I felt like asking for help was a sign of weakness, and I felt compelled to endure on my own. But mostly I remained silent because I couldn’t fathom why the teachers couldn’t see the bullying right in front of their faces and understand it for what it was. I was baffled at having to show them what was happening and having to explain why it hurt so much to have to endure it. So, I never did.
birdsongs vibrate moods
gathering for the ride home
we flock and migrate
I would bus home after a particularly rough day of being teased and bullied for wearing generic versions of Converse shoes and a Michael Jackson jacket only five years out-of-style. Sometimes mom would have tuna salad on Ritz crackers waiting for me. I don’t think she knew all that was going on with me, but I suspect she knew I was traversing a rough patch. She never asked about it, but she would talk with me, cracking corny jokes to get me to crack a smile and laugh a bit. She always succeeded. I don’t know if the tuna salad was her secret weapon, but it was often present while she was peppering me with corny jokes. I miss those jokes, as well as the sound of her laugh. But the tuna salad I accidentally made in her honor was pretty tasty.
bluest sky leans west
surrounding me with comfort
memories of you
** *
Written for Terri Ann Dawson, on the ninth anniversary of her death.
I’ve been shying away from online poetry prompts recently, opting to work on a collection I hope to have published before the end of the year. But this prompt compelled me to revisit a vulnerability I’ve dealt with since I was a child.
I apologize for yet another naval-gazing (see what I did there?) confessional poem, but this one just fell out of my head. I may take it down in a few days.
Once upon an evening dreamy, reclined beyond conscience unseemly
Clean-laundry piled shotgun beside me burst forth with Terri Ann’s allure.
Her voice apparent, yet quite untimely, bubbled with laughter, light and finely-
Tuned for my perception, winding her time, which ended years before
A decade before, less or more. Is my mom’s soul now laundry lore?
I’m just baked. I must ignore.
We watched cartoons and tripped fantastic, Kush-soaked reflections, quite elastic.
Asked laundry-mother what traumatic lesson her spirit had in store?
Her laughter warmed peripherals, soft linen, looming lavender smells
Her soothing hearth of laughter tells me, unseen, with heart a-pure
Soothing song sang as she gathered with mother’s heart, rang, not demure
Laundry said, “You must endure.”
I laughed at her linen reprisal as if she sensed my suicidal,
Un-suspenseful thought-revivals. I asked clean laundry, “Is there more?”
For to suffer life in silence, its smearing rife with leering violence,
Abysmal veering into blindness; is that our fate, and nothing more?
Subliminal closed-mindedness? Should I get baked and just ignore?
Spit at fate, and what’s in-store?
My laundry-mother laughed disarming laughs, belying life’s alarming
Nature, nurturing and charming me, unanswered, insecure.
Her non-answers thrust upon me like a thirst quenched by tsunami
Voicing visions far beyond me, unseen, she sings with heart a-pure
She stings my heart, weary, unsure, with momma’s voice ringing a cure
Laundry sang, “You must endure.”
** *
Written for dVerse Poetics’ The voice of the monster, hosted by Björn. I know I’m a day late, but I thought I’d share an actual ghost story that happened to me about a week before Halloween, when my mom visited me during a low point. I’m agnostic, but I believe my mom dropped by to kick my ass, get me to stop feeling for myself and keep grinding for the fam. Perhaps in my case, the monster was my depression? (Who am I kidding? It’s almost always my monster.)
Written for dVerse’s Quadrille #42, a poem of hope, hosted by De Jackson (Whimsy Gizmo). Other’s have contributed more hopeful poems here. Sadly, I’m pretty depressed, so it’s difficult to keep hope alive these days.
Greetings! And what has brought you to see me, Mr. Dawson?
You see, I’ve found a small lump that has amassed mass distress
And would you say from day to day that you feel mad depressed?
A curveball, but yes, I confess feeling less than awesome.
Do you drink too much? Feel out-of-touch? And if so, how often?
Maybe… Yes… I guess the process has me viewing my own coffin.
Do you feel like a let-down to all who love you in life?
Is your med-degree in poetry? Why yeah, I bear that strife.
And how often would you say that you indulge in marijuana?
What? I’m here for my lump. Kindly address that instead.
Evading the question? But why on earth would you wanna?
No answer? Let’s refocus. My prognosis is something you’ll dread.
How much time do I have left? I know that I am a goner.
There is no lump, Mr. Dawson. It is all inside your head.
** *
Inspired by dVerse MTB – Neruda and the free verse sonnet, hosted by Bjorn, but not shared there, as this is not quite what he was looking for in a Petrarchan sonnet. The subject matter is inspired by actual events. When I saw Bjorn’s post, it gave me the idea to create a conversation in sonnet form. [EDITED: Bjorn suggested that I share it on his prompt anyway, so I did! I also tightened a few lines in my poem. The flow was bugging me.]
Did I just invent a new form? Surely someone has already done this. Meh. It was a good de-stressing exercise anyways.
If you’re curious about Petrarchan sonnets, head over to dVerse. Also check out some examples here.
Hephaestus’ Waste & Cosmic Rubble 