Maybe If–dVerse Meeting the Bar

Photo: writingforrecovery.com

I’d noticed
how she
pushed that piece of Kung
Pao Shrimp around
the plate and left it
balancing
precariously
on the edge.

If I’d taken time
to hear to the words,
she didn’t speak.
Or if I’d
caught the way her
eyes avoided mine,
staring at some
distant intersection
on the horizon
of her world.

If I’d paid attention
to the curtains
drawn tight against
intrusion
or if I’d wondered why
she never called
me back.

Maybe then she
would not have chosen
to die so soon.

I’m hosting Thursday over at dVerse for Meeting the Bar and asking you to consider issues that inspire you most, and to write a poem using your distinct poetic voice. I hope you will meet us there. The doors open at 3:00 PM EDT.

Death and dying are frequent themes in my writing…in case you haven’t noticed. This is based on a true story. Although I’ve worked with persons who suffer from depression much of my nursing career, I didn’t pick up on it. When you’re close to someone it’s easy to miss the obvious, I’m sorry to say.

Transcience–A Sestina

How nature’s wonders haunt my daytime dreams,
ensnare my thoughts in utter timelessness.
They weave a web that captivates my soul,
a harsh reminder of life’s transience.
Our days are few, earth’s beauty delicate.
Creation holds the promise of demise.

A hawk swoops in, ensuring swift demise,
awakens morning from her sultry dreams.
soon feathers fly, then cries so delicate,
the world stands still, enwrapped in timelessness.
A fledgling dies—once more its transience,
a piecing wound emerging in my soul.

I look to nature to caress my soul,
to find an answer in the bird’s demise,
to understand this brutal transience,
her need to shatter hopes born of my dreams.
A full moon whispers silent timelessness,
breezes sifting sand-thoughts, delicate.

A meadow boasting colors, delicate;
her flowers wave their greetings to my soul.
Year after year they speak of timelessness,
return to face, once more, a quick demise.
Within earth’s womb, do seedlings dare to dream,
accept their fate, their fragile transience?

All life is brief, a cruel transience,
the thread that holds me here, so delicate
almost as though I am, myself, a dream,
a mere illusion that contains a soul.
I can’t ignore my soon-to-be demise,
would I could float in blissful timelessness.

The truth imparts ecstatic timelessness,
enduring words that trump mere transience
and thus outweigh the harshness of demise,
imparting strength to spirits delicate.
Though understanding little of the soul,
I dare to touch eternity, to dream.

My nighttime dreams give way to timelessness,
delivering my soul from transience.
This beauty, delicate, knows no demise.

Photo credit: Wikipedia Commons

Linking to dVerse Open Link Night. I encourage you to stop by and bring a poem of your own, and take some time to read and comment on your fellow poets.

Hot Chocolate and Mary

The leaves of an elm splash
dappled sunlight on the forest
floor. A chill lingers in the
air so we share hot chocolate
from a thermos, pour the creamy
liquid into insulated mugs.

Age does not prevent her
from sprawling on the earth
she loves so passionately.
She leans against the tree’s
stout trunk, says, “I’m yours.”

My mouth is dry like when
the dentist stuffs it full of
cotton rolls. Disbelief numbs
me till she laughs—a sound
as real as songs of her beloved
birds that sing their prayers
in unison from the surrounding
branches and marshy meadows.

“I’m yours,” she says again,
reminding me I’m here to do
the interview I’ve wished for,
nurtured in my imagination
since I discovered her.

“Your life,” I coax, knowing
that but a single word suffices.

As for myself
I swung the door open and there was
The wordless singing world. And I ran for my life.

“You ran to it?”

“Yes, immersed myself in beauty.”
While on and on the sparrow sings.

“And aging? If you don’t mind, that is.”

In the deep fall, don’t you imagine the leaves think
how comfortable it will be to touch
the earth…?”

…and what shall I wish for myself but,
being so struck by the lightning of years
to live with what is left, loving.

“Any regrets?”

There wasn’t
time enough for all the wonderful things
I could think of to do

In a single day…

“If you could choreograph your death?”

…Maybe on a midsummer night’s eve,
And without fanfare.

“About death?”

So it is
if the heart has devoted itself to love, there is
not a single inch of emptiness. Gladness gleams
all the way to the grave.

“And after?”

If there’s a temple, I haven’t found it yet,
I simply go on drifting, in the heaven of grass
and the weeds.

She takes her leave.
I watch her walk across the fields,
stopping to listen
or to follow the flight of a heron.
She’s alone now
with Percy her dog
and memories of having lived well.

 

I would do just about anything to spend an hour with Mary Oliver, a poet who has touched my life and my writing so deeply. This is an imagined interview. The responses in italics are all snippets of her poetry chosen from the Volume “New and Selected Poems, Volume Two.” I wrote this in response to Claudia’s prompt on Saturday but didn’t have time to develop it beyond an idea. So here it is, linked to dVerse Poets Open Link Night. The mics are open Tuesday, 3:00 EST. Check it out!

Annie

Today at dVerse Poetics, Karin Gustafson invites us to write about the color green. This is a very rough draft of a poem I’d started years ago and never knew what to do with it. The rhyme and scansion are atrocious, but I submit it as is, for now, for the message. “Annie” is a composite of two patients I cared for in a nursing facility–both named Annie. There is some truth, some fiction to the story. If you are so inclined, let me know in comments what you see as the underlying message.

Annie

Annie—her name, as I recall.
Trouble dogged her through life.
A sad life, on the streets,
they whispered in the hall.

Her son wasn’t “normal,”
or so they reported.
Who knows who’s his daddy?
an old wag retorted.

She spoke not a word,
only stared out the window;
took meals in her room
so we nurses conferred.

Couldn’t get her to change,
to emerge from the hurt
of a life of abuse,
from her choices so strange.

Then one day in November
she made this request,
“My green bathrobe,” she begged,
“It will help me remember.”

I searched through her closet,
found nothing resembling
the color she wanted,
on hangers, in boxes.

That night after work
I stopped by the mall,
found just one jade-green robe
that I took to the clerk.

In the morning, her eyes
lit the room, and her smile—
made it all so worthwhile,
a delightful surprise.

Late that night, she expired,
they called me to see,
her hands held the fabric
the green she required.

That robe was her shroud
and a photo I’d found
in her fingers I placed
of a woman so proud.

A green robe she wore,
in her arms was a baby,
That one thing she cherished,
the child she bore.

No one knows the story
of the life that she chose,
but the wearing of green
was her peace and her glory.

KeeeRak

KeeeRak, KeeeRak. Two snaps
open the black garbage bag.
“Anyone want this? No?”
Thhhlunk.
The business of after-death.

Photo Credit: Stand Up Guys

Written in response to Fred’s prompt for Saturday at dVerse Poetics dealing with short verse and linked to dVerse OLN. Hope to see many of you there! Brian and Claudia’s talent in  incorporating onomatopoeia is exceptional and pushed me to see what I could do with it. 

Hope you will join us and while you’re there check out this Monday’s  Bullfight and Pretzels, an interview with Fred by Laurie Kolp.

Wow! WordPress informs me that this is my 700th post!!

Gray–dVerse Open Link Night

Gray
He lay in silence. A fragile finch—
Its wings enfolding hollow chest.

Gray day, gray light casts gray on gray.
The room grew still.

Outside a mockingbird mocked
as life took flight on wings of silver.

Death ought not come
to such as this—a child.

 

Inspired by William Wordsworth (fictional) Lucy poems. Linked to dVerse Poet’s Open Link Night. You are invited to stop by and savor some wonderful poetry…bring one of your own! 

De-mise

Photo Credit: Michał Nowosielsk
123rfs.com (Copyrighted, used with permission)

I pause
to watch
a drop
of dew
evap-
or-
ate,

to witness
the demise
of cosmic
wonder,

await the
brilliant sparkle

of its color
a heart-
beat
just before
it dis-
ap-
ears.

A sense
of sadness
shrouds
this sacred
moment.

How can it be
that so much
beauty
goes
un-
not-
iced?

Linked to dVerse Poets’ Pub Open Link Night where poets from all over the globe gather to drink in friendship and revel in one another’s creative work. Join us–offer up a poem of your own on any theme. The doors swing open at 1500 EST!

The Metaphor of the Elephant in the Dying Room

Artist: Borg de Nobel, all rights reserved

The Metaphor of the Elephant
in the Living Dying Room

Those final days
we spent together,
ravens peppering
the green,
green grass
outside her window…

Those elephants
exposed for what
they’d always been:
chimera of secrets held

T            L
O           O
O           O
O           O
O    I    O
       N   N
       S
       I
      D
      E

the telling made us
bleed.

Over the years,
planted
on opposite sides
of the continent
our anger
oozed
like sap from
wounded bark

like pachy-
dermic pus.

I wish I’d been there,
crawled into her bed
to hold her
when blackbirds came
to set her free.

Instead I have a memory
(a dream):
her hands touching my head.

And Butter-
flies.

Today over at dVerse Poetics Claudia Schonfeld invites us to write an Ekphrasis on the incredible artwork of Borg de Noel, a Dutch artist. One image brought to mind my sister who died at age 61 of pancreatic cancer in a period of only four weeks. I spent much of that time with her, talking about our perceptions of our difficult growing up years. We were both only 7 when our widowed parents wed. During those years my parents, well-meaning to be sure, never spoke of our deceased parents–her mother and my father. Cris sent me back home the day before she died, but came to me in a dream and laid her hands on my head (in blessing). When I received the phone call informing me of her death, I was sitting on the deck with my morning coffee. A migration of butterflies invaded the yard. As a hospice nurse, I’d witnessed apparent “event” experienced by the families of my patients. This was the first I’d encountered myself.

Even if you don’t have time to bring your own poem to the Pub, I encourage you to make it a point to stop by and read about this talented artist, and while you’re at it, taste some fine poetry.

Medicine–Five Sentence Fiction

 Medicine

Nursing Home (Photo credit: LOLren)

The same question that had hounded her for years continued to pummel Irene: At the end of my life, what will I have to show for it?

The answer, she decided, wasn’t in this place—a box-like room full of white sheets, a white blanket, a white commode and the sickly smell of urine, feces and vomit.

She dragged her legs to the edge of the bed, grabbed the rubber handles of her walker, encrusted with the grime of three weeks in the nursing home, and made her way to the apple red crash cart parked down the hall where she copped a vial of potassium chloride, a 22-gauge needle, a syringe and tourniquet from the drawer that should have been locked.

After signing herself out against medical advice, she took a taxi home—her happy yellow house with the flower boxes on the window sill that had just come into bloom—the place where she had chosen to die.

Purty, her calico cat greeted her at the door, purring and winding herself about the ankles of the old nurse, who suddenly realized that the medicine stashed inside her purse wasn’t what she really wanted, not as long as Purty needed her.

Shared with Five Sentence Fiction over at Lillie McFerrin’s blog, where this week’s prompt is Medicine. Perhaps you’d like to join us with a Flash Fiction of your own!

Silence–Flash Fiction

death bed (Photo credit: Damian Bere)

Today, while working my poetry comments I happened upon a site that offers Five Sentence Flash Fiction Prompts using a one-word prompt. As I’ve been so consumed in the world of poetry and the business side of publishing my novels, my fiction writing has taken a back seat to poetry. And so, I thought I’d hop on in and take a few moments to participate in this challenge. This week’s word prompt offered by hostess, Lilie McFerrin, is Silence. Here’s mine:

Silence

For weeks after she died, oppressive silence filled her room, creeping like fog into every aspect of my life. I didn’t miss the curses or abuse she handed out, day-after-day, year-after-year. Nor did I mind the aloneness of it all. Even the hospice nurse, when she visited to reclaim left-over supplies and medications, said nothing when she saw the empty morphine bottle. But in my mind, silence screams its verdict: “Guilty; guilty as charged.”

I’d like to invite you to check out my blog and website for information on my Novel, Winter is Past, published by Lucky Bat Books and available in print form on Amazon.com and CreateSpace.com, as well as in most e-book formats.

If you’re here to visit my poem for dVerse Poetics, it’s the previous post.