The Poetry Marathon

DEAR MAMA DEBBIE – Hour 4

DEAR MAMA DEBBIE

 

I borrowed a towel from my buddy Alyssa, but

oddly enough it doesn’t smell like her. Somehow

when I dry my face and inhale deep, I’m in your kitchen

with your bright smile so huge I’m worried you’ll tip over

you’re so thin, and walking is difficult but you never stop smiling

somehow hauling that grin around doesn’t take you any extra effort

 

Even then how grateful I was to know you, faintly aware

that someday you’d be gone and I’d be remembering 

your smell or your smile or the screen door swinging open

welcoming me into to my best friend’s home

like it’s my home

like she’s really my sister, like I’m really your daughter

like we’re sitting here remembering my father together

 

We laugh and cry together like I’m doing now

so grateful, so grateful, for every little moment

like how you loved the tuna sandwich from Panera

like how we sat and talked for hours and as we did

I remembered who I was when I was young and didn’t realize

how lucky I was with a whole extra set of parents who loved me too

 

So I’ll never be on another casino floor without thinking about the selfie

we took when we went out in the snowstorm and had a blast

snapped a neon-lit pic and sent it off to your daughter who asked me

if I was being a bad influence on her mother and we just roared

and I’ll never play Jenga without wishing there was alcohol involved

and I don’t think I’ll ever stop missing you, and I know

neither time nor space nor death can keep your love from us.

11am – three – no title

soft, curly warmth
belly up on my bed
snuggly nose pressing into
my arm… waiting for a rub…meow…

Dear F

I tried to see you, the way I want to

I want to feel you, the way you want to

I have stories to tell you

Oh you already knew them

You read my mind

I can’t have secrets with you

I can’t even hold them

I don’t know if a relationship is possible

But based on your expertise

Who wouldn’t want one with you

I wish I could really know you

I wish I could stand with you

In All bitterness and sweetness

In all pain and joy

In all success and failures

I wish I could know you deeply

Talking all nights till the daybreak

I wish sleep won’t come when you tell me these deep things

It’s obvious you know me more

I wish I could be with you

I want to know if I’m important

You know you are to me

Should I keep wishing

Or will you show your self?

Hour 4: Getting Back to My Roots

Hour 4: Getting Back to My Roots

 

In the beginning, we treated it

like any other class

coffee cups in hand.

Snacks surreptitiously of to the side

while we typed private messages

alongside power point slides.

 

After the professor left,

I waited a beat

before asking if anyone else was breaking out.

Everyone laughed— we all were.

 

In these semi-darkened chats

we bonded

lounging in hoodies and pajamas

in our kitchens cooking dinner

or on our beds

maybe in an office

with the sounds of kids and dogs in the background.

And we all wondered about the girl with the blank green wall

behind her when she left the room.

 

We exposed ourselves in ways

we never would have, opening

our lives on a virtual stage, lamenting

unwaxed eyebrows

the snapping of acrylic nails

one by one.

None of us bothered to shave our legs.

 

I joked about the strands of grey

more and more obvious on high def screens

disguising my discomfort in the gap between 24 and almost 40.

My laundry is full of yoga pants, and I read to my kids

every night before bed.

 

The timeline of quarantine is measured at a rate

of approximately ½ inch of hair growth

per month.

 

I weigh the cost of my youth against the inevitable journey

getting back to my roots.

THE BLANK PAGE – Hour #4

I love to write poems with images that sing

with metaphors and similes and similar things.

But today, my heads aches and my brain can’t compose;

I need help writing poetry, not simply prose.

 

Is there some secret formula hidden from me

that someone can share to set my Muse free.

It’s hour number four closing fast, I’m forlorn.

Maybe I need a bowl of popcorn.

 

No, that would be silly and messy and yuck;

I just need to hang in and I’ll get unstuck.

So blank page, you’re no help when words won’t come

so you just keep quiet while I twiddle my thumbs

 

 

4. Things

“The entire world is shining with things we cannot see.”
                                                       Akiko Busch How To Disappear, p.3

Light left from the mysterious trajectories of my children.
Threads coaxed from the moon’s edge.
Sun breaths.
The glittering confetti of birdsong and insect chatter.
Chlorophyll smoke from the leaves.
Dogs’ bark balloons rising over rooftops
Tiny stars in the grass.
All the ashes in all the moving waters.
Hands reaching out of new prayers,
the limp ribbons drooping from the unanswered.

Hour 3:The Difficulty

 The difficulty I see is a world hardened and deaf

 to our brother’s cries, oblivious to our neighbor’s suffering 

 when we hurl insults and caterwaul, 

 there is only noise 

 behind a platform we hide and

 hurt one another

 

We can be better

 

The difficulty I see is effusive hatred spilling

from our souls, a polluted river coursing through our

cities, man mired in ignorance and denial, beating down their brothers

oppression is not vanquished but is reality for those

the world sees as “other”. The dominant unbelievers of our

commonalities and connections. Those that feed on rampant “isms” prevail.

But we are the same. We are the same. 

Blood bleeds carmine in us all.

 

We can be better

 

In the world of tomorrow, 

“isms” must die, the white boy with the confederate flag must look 

the black boy in the eye and see his brother 

The minister in the pulpit must recognize his love for his wife is no purer

than the love between those two women holding hands on the street

We owe it to the world to listen, to be better

We can be better

Hour 4: A Letter to My Reflection

A Letter To My Reflection

Dear lost little girl
I want you to know something
I see you
And when I say I see you
I mean I am you
We’re older now
With laugh lines that rest
In the corners of our mouth
And crows feet wrinkles
That highlight the twinkle
In our eyes.
But I see you

Sometimes I even hear you
In a belly laugh with an old pal.
Or in a whisper that carries
The joy of a secret
That you can only share
With the best of friends

I see you
I know you didn’t get to be
That little girl for very long
This world turns girls into women
Before they even get a chance
To enjoy what it is to be a child
But I see you
And I love you

Dear lost little girl
Come out and play
You don’t have to hide anymore.

Dear Grandad

Dear Grandad

Do I call you Grandad? Or Grandpa. Gramps?
We never got to meet so we never got to clear that up.
To be honest I’m not sure I like any of them.
You do have a pretty distinctive first name though.
Valentine Hennessy.

I think Dad is disappointed that we never got to meet.
He often talks about you.
Says it’s a shame that you had your accident before Mum got pregnant
He has a lot of stories about you.

I do wonder how much of what he tells me is true.
It can’t all be drunk man from Dublin stories.
I wish we had met. I’d have had my first beer much earlier.

I’d like to think that we’d get on. I’m a wannabe performer too.
Some call me a show-off.
It would have been nice to have another one in the family I could relate to
Someone to play off?
Then again, maybe that would have gotten annoying eventually

It’s strange to write this for you
I feel I should tell you about my life
My hopes and dreams
You know, the standard stuff.
But, Dad says you’re like me (or I’m like you)
You prefer talking than listening.

There is only one picture of you in the house I remember
It’s one of you at Mum and Dads wedding.
You look absolutely shit faced!
Rum and black in one hand, a cigarette in the other
You don’t look steady on your feet.
Your grin is something though.
Kind of proud and cheeky
Like you’re laughing at a punchline only you’d get.

You look like you’re having fun.

If it turns out there is no afterlife then I apologise for wasting your time.
If there is one, I hope we can meet up someday and properly have this conversation.

I’ll probably find you near the bar.

Cheers Val

Your Grandson
David

Homespun

Her hands wove our lives

With threads tenderly chosen from her heart

Sometime spun with weary hands

She made our world beautiful and our lives were covered like our beds with her offerings.

We were warmed, we grew strong.

We were homespun.