{august break no. 30}
::
i drove
in circles
through a town
called hope
to get to this
ink black
blue dark
place
where a
loon’s laughter
echoes off
tales spun by
the milky way
while the rest
of the stars
lay their
weary heads
down
on a mirror
of infinity’s
reflection.
::
::
{august break no. 27}
is different than
summer’s sun,
spring’s sparkle,
winter’s wonder.
autumn’s light
is filled with
longer longing,
deeper gold,
shadows that are less
shadow
and more
purple.
::
{august break no. 23}
::
the rainy afternoon
that calls you outside
to sit still and
listen
for echoes of rainbow
in shapes of thunder
the tiny white spider
that slides down, down,
down
an invisible thread
to hover and spin
at your side
the slip and drift
that make it possible
to blindly dive through
silence
while wishing to be
nowhere
but here.
::
::
{august break no. 20}
i am sitting in my back entryway, which is the closest thing i have to a porch, and all i can see is blue sky. yet i hear thunder and it is raining, no, actually, it’s pouring.
apparently, there is a big black cloud hanging over my back, in that blind spot i cannot see no matter how far i turn my head.
and i think i kind of like it. in fact, i think
i’ll just keep right on sitting here
and wait for the rainbow.
{august break no. 18}
the one that was brought to me as a gift, an offering from a puffed-up proud kitten, never mind that i never asked for such a thing, never mind that it makes me cringe, never mind that it breaks my heart.
i read once that cats don’t bring you their kill as gifts, they bring them because they think you are also a cat, the head cat, the big cheese, and so, they are trying to impress you.
i get that, and part of me thinks it is kind of cool, them thinking of me as a cat, but i just wish they would bring these gifts to me too-late-already-dead instead of i-wonder-if-i-wrestle-the-poor-thing-free-if-it-could-survive?
and then i wrestle with myself.
if i were a stronger person, a bigger person, a more courageous person, i would kill this frog the size of my hand and put it out of its misery, wouldn’t i?
wouldn’t that be better than dying like this, upside-down on a cold hard sidewalk, injured and gasping for air?
or maybe that is too much like playing god. maybe it’s not any of my business. maybe that frog can’t feel anything and i am projecting my own thoughts and fears and emotions onto a creature that was never meant to have them. and is it wrong that the waiting bothers me more than the death?
maybe this is all a metaphor for something else… life, love, mortality.
maybe it doesn’t mean anything at all.
and so, i wait.
and later, much later, when i am certain the poor frog is dead, i go out and give it a proper burial. by which i mean that i pick it up with a shovel and toss it into the field out back. but i do say a few words of apology before i send it flying.
and then later, not very much later after that, there is another gift. a small bird i cannot bear to look at long enough to see if it is still alive.
i turn away and go back inside.
i have never been very good at waiting.
{august break no. 16}
i’ve begun to revel
in my blisters.
they are evidence
of mortality,
documents of despair,
monuments to motion.
they are mine.
i earned them,
i asked for them,
i paid for them.
i cannot move forward
without them.
and beneath the
worn leather
that created them,
they’ve acquired
the importance
of god.
::
::
::
