Tag Archives: Solstice

Soon?

15 Tuesday Dec 2020

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The neighbor’s bathroom door slammed.
He’s a very good slammer.
My eyes opened and saw Christmas cactus silhouette
on the windowsill, echevarria’s sawtooth lump,
prayer plant’s leaves erect as they are not during the day.
It was a miracle I slept between then and then,
I dreamed, and hated the dream and
wanted to call you and tell you I’m sorry even though it was
just a dream about your fish in a tank, saltwater in fresh,
giant in small, and that you just didn’t seem to care.
I catalogued my pains and knew I would not sleep anymore.
Loud footsteps cross downstairs.
His microwave door thumps closed: breakfast of champions.
Nurse shadow passes my window, bundled.
It will be light soon? I asked swaying bare branches outside.
The laptop is so cold on my wrists; I turn on the heat
and hope it will satisfy the plants on the sill whose magenta faces
press desperately to the cold pane.
It must be light soon. It was dark at five, surely the sun will come soon?
Where is that cool cobalt that cancels coal dark,
sherbet palette on the way? Now? Is it now?
These are the long nights of winter in this hemisphere
5PM and the timers kick on the courtyard lights
6AM they’re still glowing
When the light finally comes I see crows flying west
as the dragonflies did in late spring, certain.
The crows of Middletown flew west late in the day,
I could tell the time by their flocking
as I sat near tall windows, chatting on the phone about nothing.
Cars dripping dew awaken, Navies on their way.
The sun’s trajectory short like patience.
My plants drink, hungry, and I use my indoor voice to say
“Good morning” and I rub their leaves gently.
I dread the night.

(in Just-) e e cummings

21 Thursday Mar 2019

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in Just- 
spring          when the world is mud- 
luscious the little 
lame balloonman 

whistles          far          and wee 

and eddieandbill come 
running from marbles and 
piracies and it’s 
spring 

when the world is puddle-wonderful 

the queer 
old balloonman whistles 
far          and             wee 
and bettyandisbel come dancing 

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and 

it’s 
spring 
and 

         the 

                  goat-footed 

balloonMan          whistles 
far 
and 
wee

Solstice at the Thirsty Camel

22 Friday Dec 2017

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There is glitter on the table and salt in my book
gritty on my arm as I press down to write.
I sip and lick salt from my fingers.

No one sits in the center of the room
bodies huddle at the bar, hug the walls,
so I sit at the back where I can see you all
Ballcaps, hoodies, Santa hats, sweaters
Blondie in a ballgown texting who knows what.

I claimed a table for friends tonight,
brought a candle and journal to fill the time until their faces appear.
One by one they come and we make the ‘howdy stranger’ talk
over light beers, battered onions, and speakers playing a bit too loud.

She came in last, her withered body wrapped in sagging jeans
and a pretty white sweater made of cloud,
her face tells me her kitchen is on fire.
We danced around her fire all night trying to douse it with smiles
and talk of the sunlit moon, Saturn in transit, but
she wanted to sit in her kitchen fire.
We left her there watching as she poured old wine into older skins
wondering why everything in her world leaks
pushing hope away on the longest night of the year.

Lenny came on and gently, so very gently, plucked strings in the dark
to tell us about that famous blue raincoat, the one torn at the shoulder
and I knew we were meant to be here

and that we should always carry hope like a lighter in our pocket
for those nights we go astray.

Writing through seasonal change

15 Friday Dec 2017

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If I were in New York on my drive in to work and on my way home I’d see lots of cars with christmas trees tied to the roof, headed for a warm house soon to be seated in a bowl of cool water the cat will surely drink from.  Folks will add evergreen nutrients and water their needley tree so its boughs will stay risen and green as they add tinsel, orbs of glass, or baby’s first ornament from sixteen years ago.

I haven’t seen many cars go by with trees on their roofs here in Virginia. Maybe that’s because they’re all on the interstate while my business usually keeps me on the “back roads,” or maybe it’s because folks lean towards artificial trees, who knows. Either way, there will be evening road trips where we pile into cars and head for neighborhoods where streetlights still look like gaslights decked in climbing pine needles, festive ribbons, homes adorned with candles and others filled with inflatable icons, christmas music blaring, preparations begun in September.

All I know is that I watched him take the fairy lights down. The backyard is his purview and he’s in charge or almost in charge of everything in it. There will be no christmas tree in his house this year because they are leaving, headed for the lands of three-foot-snow. The fairy lights will be gone. His yard will be empty. His puppy will dig holes far away and learn the joys of snowplowing headfirst at five in the morning.  All life is tucked into boxes marked this room and that room and his kayak will be stuffed last into the moving truck.  A new neighbor will come, and I doubt they will finish the mural his wife began on the property wall.  I will miss the tiny blue fairy lights that lined his fence, that gave me comfort all those nights I paced and watched the trees sway or thrash depending on the mood of the wind.

I think about the saying “still waters run deep” as I spritz my windows in preparation of sticking holiday clings to them.  That will be the extent of my decorating. No lights, no noise. Just a quiet acknowledgement that I still believe in peace and joy and love. Every card I sign carries hope and goodwill, and I wish it all for my neighbor as he moves into his winter wonderland.

Treasures?

21 Wednesday Dec 2016

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When I could stay awake no longer, I curled into a tightly made bed. The horns of the moon glowed orange. Tree branches silhouette on the wall, nodding. I said, “tonight I will write about sleeping with you. I will write. Sleeping with you.” I hoped if I lay the dream on my pillow it would unfold like roses and bleed on the page in the morning.

But tarantulas came, robin’s egg blue. Stunned on my plate. Ghost crabs, pink and white, blinked, stunned on my plate. I told the people who sat all around me, “I cannot eat these, they are still alive, look and see.”  But no one would believe me. Their food was full dead and still on their plates. I wanted a dream of beauty, but this order came instead.

I came to the ocean this morning. It’s full cold beneath the balcony, but once I stood in the sun it was too warm for this sweater. A Navy ship diesels across the flat ocean, horizon invisible in the haze.  A small, pink stone leaps into my hand. I tuck it into my jeans where in seconds it becomes an ice cube on my thigh.

I wanted to write  love song today, or a song of praise for the longest night, the shortest day. I wanted to write sea shells but only rusticles came slaloming out the water pipe. I wanted to write.  I wanted.

Breathe Dark

22 Tuesday Dec 2015

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Solstice.  The longest night.  Sweeping out the dark corners of my heart.  They say pressure and time makes diamonds. What about dreams? What about art? What about the weakest spots in the heart that sprung leak, spilling out and do I care if it overflows?  Will it make precious words worth sharing?

I carry in me the longest shadows, the hardest heart. The glow of a candle against the longest night is kind, but weak.  It is a sigh from the goddess who knows there is nothing she can do.

So the time comes to choose. To decide if I will share shadows today, cast gloom on all, or walk in sunlight on the shortest day of the year. Some things just won’t be swept away like silky cobwebs adrift on the breeze. I choose you. I choose darkness.

Let tomorrow take care of itself…

Becoming

14 Monday Dec 2015

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Give me the strength and the grace to get through it, this shedding that happens all at once, this brick wall that falls down upon me that I can’t get out of its way fast enough.   Even the snake, miracles of color that explore the earth on their bellies, seekers of heat, shed slowly, so slowly, not allatonce in this raw way that I do, sometimes.

When we shed we are vulnerable, it hurts, and we do not wish anyone to see our new, naked selves until the shedding is done. We are ready. We are become.  Even we do not know what color the goddess will paint us (or will we choose our own color to spite her like some tattoo that daddy hates?)

I wish I could shed slowly like sleepy trees in summer, one scarlet leaf, one saffron, calling it a day, leaping from the belly of a C-130, parachuting to the ground, nestling in the grass, one great fall at a time. Keep my shy birds hid until their true songs are ready to be sung.

Solstice, grant me strength and grace to get through the long, dark nights (long and dark, as it should be!)  I think I am ready for snow now, a cold white blanket to see where she been and where she’s bound to be. Allatonce.