24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
Temporary
Tempo
Temperature
Aperture
Miniature
Miniscule
Ridicule
Rid myself of feeling
This
Feel absolutely anything but
This
Forget anything exists but
This
Enraptured
Encapsulated
Swept up in this sensation
That presses my senses
Pulls down the defenses
And this
Is only
Temporary
trapped, where every breath is a question
every answer is silence
every portion is not-quite-half
push and sink through the morass
the blood is blue and the water is black
bubb bubb a bubb, dubb a bubb dubb bubb
An ophan, some aunts
Seagulls hoist fruit in the air
Centipede protests
The hatchet forgets,
but the tree remembers.
The hatchet is busy.
The hatchet has its own share of scars,
marred by the mishaps and mistakes
of a clumsy handler.
The hatchet remembers collisions.
It remembers that it won most of them,
and the ones it didn’t left minor scratches.
It still has work to do.
The hatchet doesn’t know about the tree.
It knows the feeling of victory, or
perhaps soreness after a tough won fight.
It doesn’t even think itself sharp,
let alone dangerous to a mighty tree.
The tree has nothing to do but remember.
It was left in the field as a stump,
cut down to size but still living,
green saplings springing from the old wood.
It has years to grow around the wound.
The tree had been growing for years before.
It was tall and proud and strong,
and then the hatchet came with brutal blows
and a wicked edge that chipped away
until the tree was nothing of itself anymore.
The tree does not grow as it did.
It regrows awkward and curled around the stump,
hunched down to protect itself, twisted
into some strange shape it does not know,
but that might repel some unknown future axe.
INFINITY & BEYOND
I count the stars and place them in my hand, my heart.
— Zeina Hashem Beck, “Ghazal: Samira Tawfiq Sings A Love Poem”
Near the edge of the rooftop pool,
distance falls away, infinity moves closer.
Still as a heron on a river bank
waiting for telltale movement,
the woman looks up, and away –
her gaze grazing unseen stars, planets.
Twilight approaches,
is coming our way.
Infinity moves closer.
I will find any reason to celebrate you
my love
I want to shout your name from a moving car
letting the fields know that you are warm
warmer than the sun that nourishes them
We move in sync, your hand on mine
holding on tight when the other feels like they may
fly away
You are solid and sweet
a hard candy
wrapped in shiny blue foil
You are a locomotive, chugging along
moving and grooving
knee that goes up and down up and down
We fit together, like that was why we were born
to find the other and shoulder into one another
floating through life united
I never tire of telling you I love you
and never bore of hearing you tell me you love me
one day to celebrate you doesn’t feel like enough
So I’ll celebrate you with every breath and every kiss
my Capricorn lover
my dear sweet James.
Autumn.
Spring, and summer.
When the crops are picked.
They will come.
When you call on them.
Under the twilight of the moon
standing
waiting
For her to cast over me
beaming her knowledge
into my every pore.
Excited to learn more
looking up
almost begging for her to take me in
as her own personal vessel.
Three couples sat around a table.
What was to become a dinner party
Soon became a fable.
Each brought their favorite beverage to share.
One by one, the husbands would hear
The best life lessons their fathers had taught.
While on the other side of the table,
the wives, somewhat distraught,
offered tight-lipped what they had learned.
Husband number one proudly exclaimed the value of food earned.
“My dad said, “if you give a man a fish, he will eat for a day,
but if you teach him to fish, he will eat always.”
His wife gently added, “He forgot to teach you
to clean the fish, so your wife wouldn’t throw them away.”
Husband number two cautiously looked at his wife,
before offering his fix-it lessons on life.
“Careful,” she said. “It could be a long time before bed.”
He wisely passed the torch to his friend.
The virtues of farming were the next husband’s wisdom lend.
“Grow it yourself, eat from your land.”
“Ah yes, he was right if you pay your hired hand.
and make sure it’s ready to put in a pan.”
“Now, Ladies, be fair.
If it weren’t for us, you’d not have a care.”
“Aren’t you sweet,” the wives offered their joke.
“If it weren’t for stores, you wouldn’t be broke.”
The moral of the story is to work as a team.
Don’t make life harder for those you esteem.
You always got gypped
So many birthdays in a row
Then Christmas
Then New Year’s
By Jan 7 we were holidayed out
Our money was gone
That cake was too much
After a month of sweets
Now I would give anything
To bake you a cake
Watch you open a mountain of presents
I know celebrations made you
uncomfortable
But your being alive deserved celebration
Now I mark that day
As another day without my Dad
A day after Christmas
And New Year’s and all those birthdays
I celebrate it solemnly
I write you a poem or a Facebook post
And I think about you
I wonder about you
You gave me far more
Than I ever gave you
You deserved so much
You never got