Tag Archives: poetry

by

Foul sweets

This is for the Ronovan writes weekly haiku prompt. The words are foul and sweet. I am at a medical conference where we are really delving into diet and how the high sugar/ high corn syrup and high carbohydrate typical american diet increases our risk of inflammation. Eat more vegetables! And here is the poem….

Foul sweets, treats greet us

Meet us, daily folly. We

growl at sweets, eat meat.

 

The picture is a mushroom growing out of a tree on the Olympic Peninsula.

 

 

 

by

Idaho Gigolo

 

 

He can dance
He can prance
He’s a horse
Of course
Idaho Gigolo
Idaho Gigolo

He can dress
With the best
Talk trash
With a splash
Plays golf
Like a dream
Charm flows
In streams

He can dance
He can prance
He’s a horse
Of course
Idaho Gigolo
Idaho Gigolo

Doesn’t stress
No mess
Tennis pro
Don’t you know
Fine wine
Fine food
Helps to put him
In the mood

He can dance
He can prance
He’s a horse
Of course
Idaho Gigolo
Idaho Gigolo

No sport
Too small
Smiling charm
Pervades them all
He’ll help you
Buy a bike
Knows just
What you’ll like

He can dance
He can prance
He’s a horse
Of course
Idaho Gigolo
Idaho Gigolo

Likes to sail
On a yacht
He knows
He’s hot
Very handy
Deck candy
Getting sandy
Fine and dandy

He can dance
He can prance
He’s a horse
Of course
Idaho Gigolo
Idaho Gigolo

previously published on everything2.com

by

My mom loved me

My mom loved me

It’s herself she didn’t love
She didn’t love her anger
She didn’t love her fear
She didn’t love her sorrow
She didn’t love her shadows

She packed all her troubles in her saddlebags
and rode forth singing.

When I was angry
she felt her anger
When I was scared
she felt her fear
When I was sad
she felt her sorrow
When I felt my shadows
she felt hers
I hid my shadows

I hid my shadows for many years
and then my saddlebags were full
They called me

I dove in the sea
I rescued my anger
I rescued my fear
I rescued my sorrow
I rescued my shadows

At first I couldn’t love them
My mom didn’t; how could I?

But I loved my mom
I loved all of her
Her anger
Her fear
Her sorrow
Her shadows
Her singing and courage

I thought if I could love her shadows
I could love my own

It was hard
It took months
I looked in the mirror at my own face
And slowly I was able to have
Compassion for myself

I am sad that my mom is not
where I can touch her warmth
and tell her I love all of her
I tell her anyway

I’m finding many things as I surface from my dive
Sometimes I feel the presence of angels
I was looking for something else
I found a valentine
that she made me
No date
Many hearts cut out and glued
to red paper

I am so surprised

My mom loves me
shadows and all
now and  forever.

Sometimes I feel like a motherless child Sweet Honey in the Rock

I took the photo of my mother working at the etching press while I was in college.
This was previously posted on everything2.com in 7/2014 and written before that.

by

The future of medicine

we recognize the true embodied mind
we stop the stigma of the many beaten down
the damage done in childhood caught in time
hearts open and lift the broken off the ground

we learn that diagnoses are a crutch
drugs plaster over deep and seeping wounds
mental labels hurt the patients oh so much
we learn to listen: broken hearts sing grieving tunes

cruel medicines and thoughts are shelved for good
gentle boundaries surround hearts to keep them safe
we rise as friends and families and doctors really should
the angry monster revealed as longing waif

damage done in childhood to the brain
lays survival pathways that we no longer call insane

The photo is me and my sister Chris. I do not know who took it, but I think it was at my maternal grandparents. They are deceased, my parents are deceased, my sister is deceased. I don’t know who to credit.

by

Exercise the wanting self

Achy this morning

Busy on Monday
Virus on Tuesday
Throwing up and
cancelled clinic
Beloved visitors all week
Worked, nauseated Wednesday
Thursday almost better
Evening festive
But up 1 to 4 am
with someone way too sick
phone to specialists
six times
finally I tell her
if she is not transferred
I think she will die
She chooses to go
Slightly groggy clinic Friday
Hard to type

Achy on Saturday

I make myself
go to the pool
to swim laps
I know
it will help

In the water
the wanting self
is noisy
I want goggles
I am wearing a mask
It leaks
Why haven’t I gotten goggles
I deserve them
Moratorium on spending
currently
and haven’t had time
and I want that
beginner yoga kit
and other things

The wanting self
makes me tired
and it is silly
to want so much
Stymied, the wanting self
goes on about work
I am on lap number twelve
I think
I am uncomfortable
with Mr. J in clinic
who keeps wanting
more pain medicine
and complains about
my boundaries
In the water
I realize
that he is no more comfortable with me
than I with him
I am pleased
to admit that
and can refer him
to a pain clinic
The lady next to me
has a powerful breast stroke
long deep glide
under the water
The wanting self
wants to swim like her
Why don’t I exercise more often?
I am lazy
Maybe I will exercise
before my first cup of tea
every morning
The wanting self
builds castles in the water
plans
that wash away
I wonder if the wanting self
builds up
is stored
in my muscles
and exercise
exorcises
the wanting self
That would explain
fibromyalgia
better than anything
I know of
and why exercise
is the best treatment
and maybe that is why
exercise
and exorcise
are so close
I picture all our
wanting selves
sloshing around the pool
released
they dissipate
Does chlorine
inhibit their return
to our bodies?
We climb sleek
from the pool
and shower

I am less achy
still tired
but my muscles feel
polished
pumped
blood flow
has returned

I must exercise
more often
and exorcise
the wanting self

by

unbearable

each time
I think
I can’t bear it

it hurts too much

you are hitting me when I am down

but then I know
that I have come too close

icarus to the sun

you melt the wax from my wings
impassive
as I fall
from the sky

you forget
I forget
that the sea is my true element

not the air

I fall into the sea

I am safe
no wings
no air
no burning sun
just the depths
my tail is back
and the painful split is healed

I swim
down to the depths

I remember
that you torch me
because it is unbearable
to be loved

you stand on shore
apollo
bright and beautiful

I wonder if you will call me forth
from the froth

I wonder if I will come
forth