Violet B Knows You

And you're ok.

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What if you were here?

How fun would be that be?

I’d be here,

You’d be here

And not there

In that dirt.

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THE SHADOW

I don’t think I ever was a baby.  I recall remembering and in it all I’m never a bird like you said I was. Perhaps I forgot I was a sparrow or a peahen or a penguin or a left over half sandwich with wings.   Instead, I think we start as shadows— things parents realize out of periphery while they touch bellies and bioilluminate, making our little dark faces flicker on the walls and against the bricks.   Crouched in tucked away thoughts till the sky screams “now!” we step from floorboards or shrink to mouse holes where filaments grow orange and dark,   but, Little Robin,   there is only one way  to adventure.

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“Let everything happen to you: Beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final.”

— Rainer Maria Rilke, Go to the Limits of Your Longing

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We Don’t See Her

We don’t see her, you know We don’t walk her talk her Bake her in a pie We don’t grab at rocks Fill ‘em in our socks We don’t do these things

And if we did do these things It wouldn’t be to her It would never occur to her That the pain from us Came from us

The pilot is her, she claims What good is a swipe Or a jab, a grab and a stab That when we land this plane She signs her name

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I probably should be more like her.  I know that’s what everybody thinks. Dinner parties and boyfriends in business suits. She’s never drank until sunrise or had a walk of shame. Every choice she makes is so good I want to scream. And sometimes, after a really bad hangover or bad lay, I’ll make a vow that I’ll do just that. I’ll out do her, I will be the best daughter, and the pride and joy of the entire family. And I will, I’ll do all the right things. I’ll make salad, for crying out loud, and drink green tea, even though it smells like B.O. I’ll hit the gym, I’ll watch documentaries on Netflix. I’ll go on dates on Match.com, with boys who don’t hold hands until date three and talk about how much they admire their mother.  And I’ll smile in the mirror and tell myself- “See, you can be good.” And I’ll smile even harder because I’ve made myself be right.

But, eventually, a thought about Mom creeps in. In that hospital bed on a constant chain of saline solution and morphine as the cancer won. Her eyes glazed over, barely able to see us timidly at the foot of her bed as Dad held her limp hand and wept.

This was the end of the best person I had known.

This was the result of a good life.

And when I think of that, I cancel plans on my Match.com Mama’s boy and go out. Go out like tomorrow doesn’t have any promise.

Because it doesn’t.  

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cuddles. now.

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The Road Trip

I could drive through the night-- cover the distance from me to you. I could swill and sweat coffee I could scream love songs every one knows but I only half know  and chip away mile markers-- each a scathing rebuttal to your “How the hell did we go wrong?”

And when dawn vomits streams of unyielding light, stabbing at your boarded up windows, your unfettered lawn your bashed in front door I’ll know at last.  Finally.  Thank god. That the answer wasn’t 

just me.

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I can't hear myself

And when I can  I don't like  What I say.  No one owes me  Their apologies--  Any wrong  Can't really be wrong  In the grand  Scheme of what  Is in your way.

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One Day

I thought I’d be happy

when others finally 

heard my voice.

Today I’m alone

and ecstactic

because I finally

heard myself.