Was There a Good King and Where Did He Go?

comments welcome, i just hate the tag

Has Anyone Written a Poem About Me?

Her room was covered in tarps and paint
so she dragged a mattress in next to the dryer
and let the rumble and the words on the page lull her
to sleep each night as the porch light spilled up and in.

Shadows moved in and out
with piles of memories in their arms
to be separated into whites and colors
and she pulled the blanket up to her chin
as she felt the cool of the summer night
through the pane of glass at her back.

Violent shouts tore vocal chords
but dulled as they rippled through wooden floors
where she lay with her arms over her sisters
as if she could stop anything at all.

So was it really a surprise when she took flight
straight into the sun? Into golden warmth ensphered?

Who is she now who walks down roads without sidewalks
laced with wires upon wires and the flickers of stray cats?

You think you have lost her, but here she has come into focus.
She waits for spring and the gentle wind that will pull her
again into the mountains, where no porch light could reach
and nothing but earth rumbles
and nothing but the stars shout.

March 31

You didn't want to stay
for the cherry blossom blooms
and the next warm day.

You didn't want to stay
for his first steps, his first words,
and the joy of him calling you.

You didn't want to stay
for another stretch of loneliness
when we had to leave you for a while
and I don't blame you,

but I wish I knew
you loved the snow from the old window
and the breeze from the new.
I wish I knew.

April 2

One arm for dropping and one arm for picking up.

Littering non-negotiables one by one among whispers
and collecting grief like a small child to carry with me
for the rest of my godforsaken life.

It was good while it lasted -- a happy life with a free hand
to write poems that knew nothing of the permanence of an ending.

It's not a game anymore -- there is no save and restart,
you will simply never smile the same way again, forever.

Who is around to see if you let go of a few standards
shard of stained glass by shard of stained glass --
it's not like you had a chapel to put them in anyway.

In the end I think we are all become driftwood --
who knows what shape we were when we were born
far away in a living, sunlight forest.
Who will ever know, after that last winter storm on the lake?
And the last? And the last?

April 3

The ducks run across the grass to meet us.
What have we done to deserve their grace and trust?
Beware, beaked babes. Our species bombs and rapes.

This is not what I say. Instead my hand is outstretched
as if I have always known I deserved this.

So, then is there a God
who picks the position of the clouds each day?
Does he kill with a plan or at random,
and is he like me in that way?
Seeing where the crumbs fall
and if the ducks will get them
before the spring wind hurls them away?

April 4

There is an unfinished promise of sunnies
that she carries in her pocket
and pulls out in bright afternoons
that blind like the hospital lights
and hush like the hospital hallways.

Without knowing, was she a strength and a distraction?
Needing care and having a future,
as opposed to needing care and likely expiring there
on the bendable bed?
But it was just some kind of adventure --
new official hallways and nurses in uniforms
and hotels without pool time (strictly sad business)
until the call at the coffee shop
that crumpled her into the counter.

Except when the deceased is two generations removed
it is easier for the tears to wash away.
We have homework to do and proms to go to
and boys to like and malls to walk,
and in a few years grandpa just feels
like he still just a custodial dusk carride away
and surely, surely next summer
is the summer the fishing poles will come out
so they can sit on the dock together
for the first time.