The Poetry Marathon

The Muses are being elusive again,

like they want to hide from me or something.

Don’t they know I know their strategies?

Don’t they see how important they are?

Why do they hide behind the trees?

In the cupboard?

Why do they look at me and laugh?

Daring me, toying with me?

I do try to coax them, cajole them, pay them even.

But some days they just sulk,

or abuse

or worse yet

they play hide and go seek.

Do they know I am on a deadline here?

If it isn’t one thing

it’s something else.

Or at least it’s something,

but it could be nothing.

All the glitters is not always gold

Sometimes its glitter.

Or sparkles.

Or even fool’s gold.

Like cubic zirconia.

It shines like a diamond.

You don’t cry when you lose one.

But well, the real diamond is nice.

Despite the efforts to get them

Never mind. Slavery sucks.

But so does a cubic zirconia.

when you are told it’s a diamond.

It’s always something.

Some way of saying to us,

what we think matters.

It doesn’t really.

They are just things.

But it’s always something,

isn’t it?

The afternoon is sauntering by.

The sky is nearly clear,

just a few far-off clouds

that do not pose any threat.

It is warm, I sit under one fan,

another whirs in behind me.

I am aware Bear and Duke are nearby.

Poem number 12,

the halfway mark.

It is downhill from here.

The gentle clicking of the keyboard,

the whir of the fans,

the blue, blue sky,

all reminding me to hang on,

be strong,

Dance with the poems

in front of you

Let go of the poems behind.

Write for this moment in time.

There is nothing ordinary

about the beginning of a poem.

Somewhere magic is released.

A small glow of a word or concept,

a flicker of truth.

Magic.

Words descend into ideas,

not fully formed yet.

Birthed anyway.

An enchanted beingness,

from a glimmer of the mysterious.

Love is doing dishes,

making dinner.

Holding hands at the movies.

It is singed with frustration

and joy.

It is worry in the hospital waiting room.

It is sticking around through good and bad.

Love is communication and respect.

It is founded on attraction,

but grows with admiration and need.

Love is saying “I’m sorry,”

when it needs said.

Saying “I’m sorry too,”

when it needs said.

It is accepting responsibility.

It is finding the path together

and honoring the other when that path splits.

It is belief in one another.

Keeping the other’s best interests at heart.

Love is vast and comical.

Touching and fanatical.

Love is everything and nothing.

Love is the Universe

and the blade of grass beneath our feet.

It’s just me and this screen

In a battle for control

Will the white win

Or the words that escape my fingers

The white pulls out all the stops

To stop me

To put an end to this madness

But I cover it well

Lobbing words and phrases at it

Until it succumbs and allows me passage

Into the unknown

This island has felt many griefs

Blood flowing in generations past

The sacred valley of Iao

The battle of Olawalu

Blood red Wai

sacred bones buried deep in the hillsides

But this grief is new

Modern

Instead it is ash

Homes leveled

Businesses gone

Artwork lost

Human remains unclaimed

Human remains not found

Burned out cars

The smell of smoke and despair

The loss as big as the Pacific

Tears and chants

Songs and sorrow

Blistering memories of what is lost

Lahaina burns in our memory

Forever

It too will become sacred ground

Just like Iao and Haleakala

The West Maui Mountains

stand in reverence

The story will be told in hula

The sadness will be generational

encoded in DNA

Life goes on

As the dead are buried

mourned and celebrated

One step forward

Rebuilding what was lost

An island grieving

Within the volcanic rock

and the honeycreepers song

The ocean breaks

Hopelessness will dissipate

But the change

as palpable as when the Islands

were stolen

And land sacrificed

This grief is internal

This grief belongs to Hawaii

This grief will not go away.

This grief is Maui

The words escape me.

They tumble around on the floor,

fly across the ceiling,

wave from outside the window.

The words are being obstinate.

Scary.

A bit too quippy.

I try to grab them

as they taunt me, laughing.

Damn how they allude me,

scorn me,

accentuate me,

elongate me.

Endlessly pulling away.

I have to trap them,

entice them,

lure them with sweet whispers.

Sometimes one will land.

I cannot move, I let it stay,

until others join it.

But if I move the wrong way

they fly off,

or tumble around the floor.

And I am wordless once again.

Duke is here.

Head hanging over the edge

of his bed

not mine, ever.

I have books piled around him.

He is fine with that.

Earlier he was on a pillow.

Lodged beneath a clean shirt.

Before that he watched his dude

type his own poems

in the other room.

Duke does not understand

crazy people up

in the middle of the night.

Writing things and making noise.

Now he lays, head turned

I can just make out his smile.

He pretends to be annoyed.

But he is a happy boy

sleeping between piles of books.

On his favorite bed.

Laying precariously

on the edge of his world.

Amelita came to me in a dream.

She was going to move

to Oahu.

She said she could drive those

super-highways.

I thought it was a risky move.

She lost everything in the fire.

Like so many others I loved.

Just the clothes on her back.

Last I heard

she was being shuffled around.

But she had shelter

and food.

and a job if she can get to it.

In my dream she was moving to Oahu.

Like so many others.

Lahaina a nightmare,

they would rather forget.

Mysterry has a place now.

And Dorie got to go shopping

on the community’s dime.

She is safe

in a condo with family.

Carole isn’t anything.

She lost her life.

I try not to think of her

last few minutes.

But the vision is there

when I am drifting into sleep.

It wakes me up, shaking

every time.

I dreamed Amelita is moving

to Oahu

to start over.

Her gleam had returned.

The one she had when she laughed.

Sorely missing the last time I saw her.

Tim is safe.

Peg won’t rebuild

she is moving to California

Closer to family I guess.

I don’t blame her.

Ellen was in Australia.

Missed the whole thing.

But lost it all anyway.

She will stay there

for six months

to figure out what to do.

I dreamed Amelita was moving

to Oahu.

A foolish dream.

It would be too much for her.

Cathy and her enormous family

made it out of Hawaiian homes.

Thank God.

There is a list of hundreds,

unaccounted for.

I scan the list, no one left

I know. Finally.

But the list of those lost

have become my friends,

my worries too.

Even though I don’t know them.

I dreamed Amelita is moving

to Oahu.

Lahaina is gone. Gone.

The store that was such a part of my life

now ash and mangled metal.

At least they are okay. Poets

Friends, employees.

Everyone safe but Carole.

I dreamed Amelita is moving

to Oahu.

I hope her broken heart

is healed again.

Somehow, someway.