The Poetry Marathon

You seemed perfect on the outside.

Landed it big in Hamilton, In the Heights, and in A Star is Born.

Engaged to your Hamilton co-star Jasmine. Life on top with a white picket fence of a promising future.

One night a TikTok video surfaced you at a strip club with a white girl.Your engagement ended abrupt. Broadway attendees spewed anger on social media platforms.

I give you the benefit of the doubt, I’m not naive. Just not quick to judge

when we don’t know what happens behind closed doors or white locked gates.

You’ve only turned thirty and seem not ready to settle down just yet.

Model for Tommy Hilfiger and compose song lyrics with YX.

You sing on Target commercials and talk on live IG.

Still appreciate your fandom and do your craft.

You become “the puzzle piece of my poem.”

Thank you Drakkar to this day I can’t smell you without remembering a generation of the late 80’s on Long Island  known as the guidos. I borrowed Mom’s amari to match up to the boys.

Thank you Tommy Hilfiger.  Remember smelling you through the 90’s at clubs with Freestyle and Hip Hop. For a time I was a Tommy Girl.

Thank you Polo for bringing me back to 1989 and Frankie holding my hands as we were partnered with to square dance in gym class. Victoria’s Secret shared with me in appreciation of him.

Today’s AXL can never compare to the male scents of yesterday. Britney Spears too floral and Chanel too expensive.

I spray Innisfree from the isles of Ireland. It accents my floral body sprays. Wait for Old Spice to find us.

“I’m not waiting to live my life, I’m trying to catch it.” Sybil Bank

They sit together

his arm around her shoulder

talk of their great grandchildren

as they watch geese glide across the surface

of the pond.

The wind is quiet

and their final send offs settled.

Golden years are full of doctors appointments,

writing out birthday cards and T.V.

They wonder why young people are always looking down at their phones and not at each other.

Ask why the BMW has to blast Rap music as it speeds by.

Together, they plan dinner and to call their oldest son tomorrow.

Today is a good day she remembers him, his arthritis isn’t so bad.

Soon they’ll walk hand in hand home,

gave up driving when their vision started

deteriorating.

It’s in each other’s arms they feel most alive.

A title of his poem,

suggested title for his book

relatable more than ever.

I remembered when I first heard

the news.

All regrets of the words

I meant to say to you, but hadn’t.

The shy poet writing in her notebook

was too shy to tell the popular wrestler

how she felt in high school.

I speak them now to a Mass card

attached to a wall with your picture.

Still  I can’t wrap my heart in acceptance

even though my mind knows you’re gone.

Each moment in every day I shed silent tears

invisible

know you hear them.

The problems with hand sanitizer is

first the pump it spins and spins before

it pops up to work.

I have ordered a new car easier than opening one.

Not to mention how it dries my skin

lotions are my only salvation.

My nails cry as they chip and crack.

Some smell fruity, some smell  faint,

mine is a margarita mix on a summer day.

Nail salon nightmares

it’ll never replace or reap the benefits

of good ole soap and water,

my forever reliable friends.

Why are we afraid to sign up as number one on a piece of paper,

first reader in a setting?

A coffee shop, library, reading, or celebration.

Why are we so shy to start the race for others to follow?

We are easily remembered as we are forgotten.

Being first helps that shy guy in the back row

resisting feel the comfort of a room.

As a new Poet Laureate recites and remembers those we lost,

I feel comfort of going first today,

raising the glass and the bar.

The futuristic laureate just might be sitting in that back seat

I know I sat that in shyness seat once.

Reading is like dancing even when we feel insecure and silly,

crowds appreciate those who have balls to stand out.

Reality T.V. is often seen staged. Underpaid actors and actresses pretending to be”real.”

Once in awhile a talented individual surfaces like a lost treasure. Erik-Michael Estrada, Lukas Rossi, Carrie Underwood, Chris Daughtry to name a few.

A musician with the voice of an angel,

a creation of a boyband,

or a frontman for a rock band.

Most days we can live without the drama back stories.

Who slept with who,

who hates who,

yelling, fighting, hair pulling…

attention-seeking jealousy on Jersey Shore.

Sometimes there is a diamond in the rough, a person who stands out from the rest.

The problem lies within this realm they originated from.

It’s not easy finding their “real”ness on reality T.V.  perceived in fakeness.

“But I have promises to keep, miles to go before I sleep.” Robert Frost

Signing up I obliged to commitment to complete the task at hand.
I will write twenty-four pieces of poetry in twenty-four hours.
I will not quit when the challenge becomes challenging.
When my eyelids feel heavy

I will drink coffee, eat chocolate to stay awake.

Even when my vision blurs with tiredness,

it’ll not scramble my ambition

the finish line miles away,

but my metaphors stir inside

stretch and exercise within me.
They wait to race upon the paper,

pace upon my screen.

Promises kept like laws obeyed,

sleep is overrated.

Las Flores, El Salvador

He hashtags #neverleaving and I know he’s there now.
Watched as Tommy rides on a canary yellow surfboard,

back and forth he turns on IG video.

it’s 2014 like he’s on his skateboard on his childhood driveway

in younger years  and I ride by in my car

as he flips his hair to the side.

”The outside was a bit more intense.”

You’d never know it by his balance.

Amped is how he appears gliding

these South American blue waters.

A year before he bailed his surfboard for heroin.

Missing a wedding day and waves drowned in sorrow.

Now Tommy funnels, barrels, backdoors, carves, and curls

charging with his brothers and his Dad.

Caught inside this memory

I chunder in disbelief that he’s gone.

Open mind sets welcome creativity inside.

Closed minds are on a trap like the Staten Island Expressway on any give day.

A new language, new religion, a song in two different languages crosses boundaries not barricaded in prejudices.

We are never too old to learn something new, open a book be embraced by cultures. Discover something, someone different from ourselves.

My Junior High crush had me fall in love with Italy. Napoledons with big Roman noses.

Thirty-five years later I still think of Frankie. Whenever Italian is spoken, tomato sauce fragrances Sunday morning air, gentle kisses on my cheek in hellos, olive skin dark and smooth with almond shaped eyes.

This book opened me and never collected dust on life’s shelf.