Nightly Anguishes, Interrupted

He all, here’s one for my boy Noah, the best tuxedo cat lad ever and frequent muse for my work. Maybe one day I’ll pull a Mary Oliver and write a whole collection of poems just about my pet, a la Dog Songs. Cat Songs? Cat Chansons? I’ll workshop it.

Nightly Anguishes, Interrupted

It’s hard for the mighty nightly anguishes,

the you’re worthless-nesses

and acidic self-loathing

to take root in my twisted gut,

in the face of these rolling waves

of heavy feline purrs,

proving there’s one who sees through

the mess of human mental clutter

and remind me of the love

and poetry of a soft and gentle night.

Hello Again

I know I haven’t posted on this blog in a while, but I recently decided to start prioritizing this part of my creative life again. You’ll be seeing weekly posts from me every Monday now, of my poems.

Right now I’m just popping in to say hi, and that I have actually been busy, and I got some worked published, not poetry though, but a nonfiction short story instead.

My short story “Talking Over Ghosts” was published in the Chicago Story Press collection Storytellers’ True Stories of Triumph, so check that out if you are interested in some of my non-poetry work.

I look forward to sharing my work here again!

The Stranger in My Path

I’ve become increasingly aware that I tend to over-apologize, make myself small and roll over for people. It’s hard, because when my therapist brings this up, I usually go “Oh yeah, sorry. I guess I do. My bad.” And then she just holds her head in her hands for five minutes trying to make her headache go away.

The Stranger in my Path.

My Eyes swept up the path
to spot a woman standing still,
and I’d already run through
half a dozen ways to excuse
myself out of her way
before a car passed by and cast
its light across her chest,
which just then wasn’t there.

I’d been drafting apologies
to my own shadow, now scattered
by some passing headlights.

Once again, my apologies
fell at the feet of
who I could be, barely there,
blinked away and gone.

Bitterly, Dandelions

Here’s a piece I wrote when dandelions started popping up again. I always feel a little bad for the bare, bald dandelions that have lost all their fluff. I wonder if they miss the yellow blooms that had all the bees and pollinators coming around, or if they just except that part’s over, (as much as a flower can accept anything.)

Bitterly, Dandelions

The unfairness found in
the dandelion’s two phases;
the do you love butter yellow bloom,
sloughed away to a puff of white.

After a youth growing in mastery
of your own stalk, cracking up through
the sidewalk, old age flips the script.
Now, you must master the art
of scattering yourself away to the wind.

A Breath Before the Show

Here’s another one from my walks along lake Michigan.

What, did you think a title like this might relate to an actual show or concert? That I might have a lively social life that involves going out and partying? Well it’s not and don’t ever slander my character by suggesting I’m socially well-adjusted or a people person ever again. Last warning!

Here’s another poem I thought of while walking alone at night.

A Breath Before the Show

One late night walk I wandered
into an exclusive show,
almost begun.

The full moon’s spotlight
shone on the still lake,
a stage tense with the seconds
before the players start.

Just what, I asked the invisible audience,
are we waiting for,
to take on a stage so vast?

The only answer I got
was an insistent shush, shush,
from the waves washing to the shore.

Horizon Blurred

I’m lucky enough that I get to see quite a few beautiful sunsets over the wide horizon of Lake Michigan. My favorite types of day are the ones where it looks like the sky and the lake just blur into one thing, not wholly sky or water.

Horizon Blurred

The horizon’s tides and sky
are in a reflective mood this evening
they each gaze into the other,
to see themselves reflected back.

Slowly, they lose track of
who is the gentle ripples
and who drips soft beams of light.

Two halves lost in each other’s own reflection
so beautiful neither
wants to wonder
where they end and the other begins.

Cat Collection (Part ? of Infinity)

Wow I went almost two whole months without sharing any poems about my cat. I can’t just go and let you guys think I’m some sort of well rounded artist that has other, more important things to right about at any time! No! There’s always at least a couple lines, some haiku, about my cat jotted in the corner of my journals. Obviously, he’s amazing. Enjoy. So sorry to deprive you for as long as I did.

A collection of brief lines about my cat being a total spaz:

The sun hits a fold
in the sheets, just so. He
takes offense, and attacks.

Then the paper scrap flutters
nervously from the fan, and
captures hiss full attention.

A whisker’s twitch
the only giveaway before
his paw attacks this pen.

No more poems tonight,
the white gloved gentleman
sits triumphant in distraction.

 

 

 

The Common Swift

Oh wow, another bird-themed poem? I swear this was unintentional. Maybe April just has me thinking of birds. They started coming back in March I’d say, but maybe that was just so they could drag April in here already.

Anyway, the idea of the Swifts, tiny birds that spend most of their life flying way high up in the air, and little to know time on the ground or any other spot I’d have a frame of reference for, was really intriguing to me from a creative perspective, so I wrote a bit on that.

The Common Swift

My eyes ache
from peering miles up
at those specks
that live whole lives in
brilliant landscapes
of rolling clouds
and air currents.

I’m seeing the faintest flickers,
of how different
one soul’s idea life on earth
can look from another,
and still I can’t stop staring.

Hummingbird

I’ve been struggling with a fear I have of letting people get close to me recently. Well, I guess technically its always been a problem but now I’m actually concentrating on it and trying to make it better so it’s been way more of a thing in my everyday life. Among other things, I of course wrote some poetry to cope.

Hummingbird

I thought I had to fear
how quickly the hummingbird’s wings
could flicker and whisk her away,
but instead now I have to fight
my own heart beating faster
at the imp perverse to crush and toss away
this little bird, before she gets
too fond of my finger.

April Thunderstorm

The one thing I can say for the rain I’ve been getting lately by me is that at least its just warm enough to be rain and not snow, (We will NOT mention the other week when it did in fact snow, despite spring technically already being on I think.)

I’d prefer for it to be a bit warmer and greener, but at least rain can help wake things up a bit, April showers and all that.

April Thunderstorm

A startled April thunderstorm
forgot the beginning of spring means
the chaos of greenery below
can roar right back
at the howling winds,
the rolling troops of thunder
and the grey, deadened sky above.

After Earth’s long sleep of winter
the skies almost mistook her for meek.
Well, now Earth whips
her riotous greenery into a frenzy of
the young, fresh and hungry
and now, as the wind whips through
the tree tops, for the first time
in months, they sound as though
they’re yowling back themselves.