24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
This ending doesn’t feel the same
It’s my first half marathon
After only ever completing the full marathon
I’m still glad I came
I knew I wouldn’t be able to complete the full one this year
And I waited until the last day
Before I chose to say
That I could do that half and be here
It was a difficult decision for me to make
And I’m glad I chose to be involved
And marked my dilemma “solved”
Maybe next year I’ll catch a break
(untitled)
The wall shatters
into a million rooms
in which we see a million dreams
Some on pause
some on canvas
Some from three steps left and 27 seconds into the future
Sum are parts of the whole
Some are parts of the hole
Some are [redacted]
Some are lifetimes as long as it takes to find the gems in the flaws
Some are the wildest special effects filled-blockbusters left over from the vivid imagination of being 15
Some are…
…just me being pressed
Some of them are voices; my voices…
…those that shaped mine; and maybe those to be shaped
Some are the stanzas that get lost by themselves
Each of these shards will cut wounds or make mosaic
This is… *yawn*
where I begin to sort the pieces
The closet in the room once held the dresses Zack refused to wear
Of course, he was a little girl then
but had I known then what was going on,
he could have been spared some amount of grief
Once he opened the closet in our bible-belt situated house
I couldn’t get him out of here fast enough
college and graduate school were elsewhere
The closet is now filled with gifts from his baby shower
and I will take them to him when I drive out for a visit next week
Friends ask what he is now that he’s a mother
He’s Zack until he tells me otherwise, I say
He’s still Zack
Once upon a time, my dear,
People didn’t have TVs or video games
(pause for gasps).
What did they do of an evening?
Read? Talk?
Yes, a little of both but after 1935
People who had a radio listened to Fibber Mcgee.
What is listening, mother?
Radio is like TV – but with no screen.
How did you know the story?
When people listened to Fibber Mcgee and Molly
The only clues to the story was
The voices of the actors and
Sound effects. So when Fibber Mcgee
Opened the door to his very stuffed hall closet
Everything fell out with a cacophony of sounds,
Bells, whistles, falling tin cans and bangs.
(This is interesting, dear),
Everyone pictured a unique closet
With different things falling
On distinctive floors.
While we listened in common
Each of us had our own Fibber Mcgee’s closet.
What does it mean to “come out of the closet”?
Coming out is about being ready, able, and unafraid.
To be who you truly are.
Who you have always been.
To tell people, “This is me.”
“Take it or leave it.”
Hoping those you love will accept you.
Knowing that not all will.
It’s about being tired.
Tired of being something you are not.
Tired of hiding who you are.
Not everyone’s “closet” is the same.
Nor is the experience of exiting said closet.
Closets come in different shapes and sizes.
Have different contents.
Some feel safer than others.
Most are dark and lonely.
Some closets are known.
Others unknown.
Or rather denied their existence.
Be who you are.
Come out and be with your people.
Closed to clothes
And filled with bones
The wooden hinges creak
The tip tip tap of many toes
Sentient pear antique
Ripped from the wall,
Not a chest
A close by closet for traveler’s ease
An armoire by technicality
My closet companion tamed
By consuming what are now skeletons
Children bounding past
Long carpeted hallways
Open eyes peering through the
Shining slit
Excited to be the last found
Till parents beckon us home
The Ordinary is What Was Extraordinary
the pilgrimage inward is never the same as the voyage back.
everything looks different and the journey seems truncated.
planning to be prepared for the unexpected, itself a contradiction,
is an exercise in trust, for once the gate is open the waters rush in
and anything-can-happen-day reaches a new maturity.
respecting the past, honoring the dead, even as I know
their deaths were brutal and unacceptable, is a delicate balance
of heart and mind. in a history of such monumental proportion
does a child here or there, a baby, teen, wife, baker or an elder
claim more tears than any other? my own aunt, uncle, and grandparents
remain lines in handwritten letters, rarely a photo, barely a story.
does piecing together fragments make their ordinary story any more
extraordinary? will witnessing their possible grave site generate closure?
the road not taken, may be ordinary, but the destination can be extraordinary.