The Poetry Marathon

I don’t like slimy things

I am not that kind of girl

I hate bugs

Spiders are not our friends

Snakes can just slither on by

You can keep your lizards

Eels and Komodo Dragons

I don’t like to judge

But I do not want to spend the rest of the night

With the heeby jeebies.

Yes, it’s interesting

To contemplate what they are

Why they do what they do

How they adapt to their environment

But I am good not knowing

I don’t need to know

I don’t want to know

With all due respect

Keep your slime to yourself

She came in

All eyes on her

I cringed

The conversation stopped

She had to be center

Every Christmas

Every Thanksgiving

It was always the same

I watched them

They all laughed at her jokes

Someone took her coat

They loved her laugh

I hated it

Too loud, too fake

She was the fun one

I was the serious one

I could not get a word in edgewise,

sideways or upside down.

Her stories had all been told before

Spoken with a loud laugh

Embellished way past the actual facts.

She didn’t tell lies exactly

The truth just evaded her

Like I did.

Her children cringed too

Her oldest disappeared

Her youngest tried to be like her

I went outside where it was quiet

I watched the smaller kids dodge and duck

Here was real laughter

I took some pictures

I zoomed in on faces

I wasn’t the only one

Lost in a crowd

Overshadowed by shadows.

She was always the sunshine

I was always the shadow

Later she left

The room sighed in relief

The conversations resumed

The room more quiet

More subdued

More relaxed

She was hard to keep up with

I never understood why they tried

The cassette tapes

Were talking to the CD’s

Seems they never get touched anymore

Ignored

Placed on a shelf

While the digital music replaces them

The albums are long gone

Victim to one too many moves

They all wondered where they were now

In a landfill perhaps

The cassettes lamented how they loved to be wound and rewound

How they were soothed when a pencil saved them from certain doom

The CD’s in their high and mighty way

Talked about how they missed doing the shuffle on a Saturday night

They shared grand stories of giant stereo systems

With AM/FM radios

Speakers that took half a room

How their music pounded the walls

Until the neighbors complained

“That was rock and roll,” the cassettes sang

” Those were the good old days,” sang the CD’s

They looked at one another

Longing for the olden days

They stared at the MP3 player gathering dust

” It’s all in their phones now,” it said.

“We have been sold out by microchips and convenience.”

They all sighed

Wondering if they would end up

In a second hand store,

In the garbage

Or left on a shelf forgotten

The future looked bleak for them all

Post about love

But don’t mention love

Make it believable

Marketable

Make the reader swoon

A soft touch on an outstretched hand

A gentle kiss on unprepared lips

A bouquet of flowers

A first date

Talk about love

Just don’t use the word

You can talk about shivers

You can talk about a face blushing

A heart swooning

But don’t say love

Cherish is alright

Like the song

Admiration, a crush perhaps

Kismet

You can refer to them as soul mates

Just don’t mention love

Don’t think it, don’t say it, don’t write it

No matter how bad you want to

Love is forbidden today

We took a cab

To a plane

We flew across the ocean

We took a bus

To a Hotel

We ordered pizza in

Too tired to go out

We took a bus to meet a train

The train rich, luxurious

Through the mountains

Landscape high and wild on all sides

At the end of the tunnel

We met a ship,

Tall, glistening

We waited to board her

In a long line

Excited

She was luxurious

As Royal as her name

Tall staircases, gold and glass

Rich carpeted hallways

Fine dining, rich desserts

We watched Alaska from our balcony

There would be a small bi-plane

To show us glaciers

Buses, always buses

Another train, not roomy and luxurious

But enjoyable

Back to the ship

Luxury

Balloon drops

and dancing

Family Dinners and photos

Over too soon

We ended in Vancouver

A bus, a gondola

Waterfalls and a copper mine

Our plane home was gone

No one had told us

I spent dinner on the phone

Our TA found us another one

Small, crowded, a budget airliner

But it got us home

Back over the ocean

To our tiny Maui

Our measily jobs

Our messy apartment

Our traumatized cat

I can’t wait to do it again

Thunder rumbles in the distance

I remember

Claps of thunder waking me from a dead sleep

Lightening snapping

The hot smell, the sizzle

The electricity charging the air

I remember the clouds swirling

Twirling,

The sky turning a sinister green gray

Shifting the world

From a warm summer’s day

to a frightening night

Huddled in basements

I remember cold so bitter

My snot froze

Ice coated windshields

Frozen fingers and toes

Thawing by the heater, numb

I remember my dog jumping on my lap

Thunder making him shake and shiver

Giant softball hail breaking windows and pelting cars

I remember excesses

Tornadoes leveling neighborhoods

Trailers twisted

Debris flying

An ice storm so bad power went out

Poles downed from the weight

Whole towns closed

Streets undrivable

I remember flooding

Underpasses closed

Basements full

I remember lightening flashing like a strobe

Through sheets of rain

Glad to be safe, in the middle of the ocean

Lightening an interesting phenomena no one fears

Rain is just rain

Snow is an anomaly

Not an ice storm to be had

Just palm trees sweeping the sky

The wind gentle and kind

High tides just enough

To delight the surfers

I wake up

My nightmares still swirling in my head

No amount of positivity can shake it

These days are dark

Pandemics, treason

Murderers caught on video

Riots, treason in broad daylight

Watching the news hurts

Sleep should be the escape

A few hours free of this chaos

Instead my dreams become as bad as being awake

These times we see how powerless we are

How powerless I am

The chaotic nightmare

Is where we are

I try to stay distant

I try to stay safe

But we are holding on

At the edge of a cliff

No rescuer

No ability to lift ourselves up

We are in a tornado

I lay down, wishing for rest

Praying for redemption

For rescue

I am safe until the nightmares begin

I wake up shaking

To find reality is worse

Behind every veil, behind every self doubt, every angry moment

I have tried to block the light, a curtain drawn across the face of love,

Yet love always wins, It’s light remains undimmed

Light unfolds, illuminates

I light a candle in a darkened room

I allow love to direct me, bathe me, enlighten me

I expose the darkness, I expose the hurt

I heal the pain, I am changed

Only Love is real

I imagine a cafe

On the Champs-Elysees

Sipping tall glasses of French wine

At sunset

I imagine a walk along the Seine

Hands held tight

The sun going down

The moon coming up

City lights reflecting over and over

Like a fairyland

I imagine The Eiffel Towel

Standing tall in the night sky

Beckoning us to climb up to the sky

To see the city from it’s perspective

I imagine the Moulin Rouge

The Arc de Triophe

Strolling through the Louvre

Notre Dame de Paris

Poetry dripping from my fingers

As the City of Lights

Sings to us

A French lullaby

I fall asleep in an ancient hotel

French ghosts whispering

Bonne Nuit- good night

Once upon a time

I curled my hair

Curling iron in hand

Curlers pressing against my head

Anything to make the straight go away

Soon I embraced my straightness

I allowed it to be flat and lifeless

I let it grow long

Past the point where it got stuck in car doors

Past the point where I would sit on it and pull my head

I cut it to shoulder length

Then to above my ears

I pinned it, put it in pony tails

Pig tails, braids

Short, long and everything in-between

Until one day

15 days from my first chemo

I found it in clumps

It was shaved that day, then shaved again

I saw my head

I saw the bumps and the scars

I found out I am more than my hair

More than some preconception

Of how a woman should look

I was more than balding

I was more than receding

I was bald

Now as it grows back

Uncontrollable

I still see how I looked before

A warrior without hair

I will never see those strands the same way again

I will brush and style and love my curls

No longer afraid

Of nothing there

My life a before and after shot

Before the cancer and survivor

From flat to bald to curls