poetry

September (2011) Daughters

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Mythili

you are still my little girl
though you try to pop out
adult (somewhat crooked) teeth
and blend Spanish and English
easily into your imaginary life

among friends you are a leader
(no tag-along little sister role)
and you wait
so anxiously wait
until you are big enough to ride
Isabella’s bike,
to read Isabella’s stories,
to find the right way to
wake up on early school mornings

in our troop,
you are Magical Mythili,
the perfect name
for the creative artist
born from the
destined-to-be-crone
little baby whose head
turned to see me walk
into the room
forty-eight hours
after birth.

Isabella

all of a sudden
you have decided
that you’re a reader

it is a simple statement,
one you would wash off your back
like the layers of shampoo
you push aside

but to me
watching you read
Laura Ingalls Wilder
just like i used to

it means more than
the thousands of words
filling your brain,
making you mine

Riona

every day a new song
a new dance
a new Spanish phrase
a new smile
from my newly school-aged girl

i was worried.
you know that
or you don’t.
you’re small.
tire easily.
timid.
dependent.

oh so calm and pleasant
the perfect student
who hugs goodbye
a friend
whose name you won’t mention
who shies away from
the video of your
performance at the assembly
who is everything
and more
than i could ever
ask you to be.

Película

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i send my camera
zoomed in and out
around our table of twelve
their words slip
like bubbles from their tongues
escaping into the heat
popping before i can catch them

drinks go to lips
songs emerge as naturally
as water flowing from the mountains
they have no idea
they are being filmed

sleep pushes at my eyelids
as the Taiwanese pasta
settles in my belly
but i could stay here forever
listening to the language
i crave to understand
immersing myself in the people
whose home i’ll never know

it is like a dream really
and i pinch myself awake
so full of life
they are so full of life
that no language
could define
just what my video
will never capture

Measurement

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the space between
when that light counts down
and how sore my muscles will be
is immeasurable

but i can measure the speed
of my tires through
the intersection
a dream in the making

i beat the limit
and make it in time
to hear thrilled immeasurable
screams of my beauties

With Perfect Fluency

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you cannot speak
with perfect fluency
the language
that i need you to know.

the meanings
that hide like
costumed schoolgirls
behind curtains

the nuances
of masked words
that shadow the pain
behind your absence.

the many ways
we say i love you
that with your foreign ears
you seem unable to hear.

you cannot listen
with perfect fluency
to silence between the words
of the language
that i need you to know.

The Sun is High

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the sun is high
young voices howl
the swing creaks
yet we lie here

i have no desire
to move from this bed,
to take my hand away
from your new goatee

oh how easy it is
to fall in love
with the morning
allowing us to stay

this is a dream
to wash away my nightmares
to feel my skin on your skin
to know you are mine

the sun is high
our plates are full
but there is time
always, for love

Self Discipline

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from the window
i hear a scream,
a bloodcurdling cry
and the baby spatting
at the middle child,
I didn’t bite you
as hard as you bit me!

this after ten miles
for my eight-year-old’s legs
pedaling like a pro
along a creek-crowded path,
hula-hooping for the band
while the little ones
played imaginary games
in the trailer

and i think,
wet dishes from grandmotherly
meal in hand,
how is it that i must discipline
this moment of violence
when i cannot keep
the smile from my face?

Step

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with these feet
you will pound it out
you will remember your childhood
your hand in his
you will run
run past the wind
as the moment
you last saw him
slides into your subconscious
and he becomes a part
of every step you take.

Sør Ås Bîk Clüb

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she wears a jersey
that shames us all
What will you do
it asks,
on your 70th birthday?

this on mile sixty-two
a record high day
where we pop out fully cooked
from sauna port-o-lets,
strap on our stinky helmets,
and try to beat the sun home

jerseys mock me:
sør ås bîk clüb
biker chicks
(with matching nest pics)
Ride the Rockies
and every other place
i don’t quite fit

men in drag
weave themselves up and down,
stopping to fix flats
and pose for pictures,
their exuberant rainbow
of wigs, skorts, and fishnets
bringing welcome laughter

the day begins with a sea
of hot air balloons
decorating the mountain-backed sky
and ends with free lunch,
an all-girl band,
and women who know
just where the road can take us.

Words

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i sent the words
(there were clicks–
not yours)
i spent the time
(there were chips–
dark chocolate)

you didn’t respond
you couldn’t read
the words too thick
the chips already melted

you left them there for me
and i placed new words
under the light
words they shared in your absence

it was strange
having you walk in like that
not quite sure
if you should use your own words
or listen to ours

you waited
i wrote
(i always do)
you flipped off the light
that let them see
what i had written

in your usual manner
you ad-libbed
they laughed their usual laughs
but i managed to
feel less small
knowing they shared words with me

you stood in the back
video on
asking me a favor
(the chocolate
sitting in a back room
unrequested)

i took your center cut
put it in the microwave
and melted it for a perfect sundae

you won’t say a word
you will never know
just how warm
how perfectly cold
it tasted as i took my words
and swallowed them

The Cost of These Brownies

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handwritten prices
on the grocery list
categorizing ingredients,
a spouse’s scrupulous pen
(cocoa: $2.76
chocolate chips: $2.38
it goes on)

several summer nightmares,
a bitter blog post,
and the hollowness
that can only come
with the absence of words

their bright faces
and innocent remarks,
the commentary carried
down the corridor,
begging for more

the bland baked cakes
from someone’s mix
hand in hand with
Friday’s sacred sweet desire

all the times
that can’t be added up
with calculators
of when they made a day,
saved a life,
or satisfied a fix

the small hands
that crack the eggs,
the small voice
that recites the recipe,
reminding me
once again
that from first bite
to last,
i am giving a taste
of chocolate
with an immeasurable price.