Warm colors not from outside

Outside, the garden’s disarray reflects his own spirit.
He gazes beyond today’s errie political mendacity,
attempting to follow the message of Thanksgiving.
The season’s story asks with answers and gives questions.
For now, nature’s bounty has shriveled to dry, itchy skins.
The joyous noise has ended, the guests all departed.
Remnants linger.

A hickory smoked ham carcass bears the scarred record
of hungry hands which sliced morsels into salivating mouths,
a thankful sharing of sustenance. Pillows and wool blankets,
suddenly cold, lie folded neatly near the futon bed,
which is now restored to its day job as a couch. No evidence remains
of the two cuddle snuggets which giggled there the night before.
Nor any more tinkling sounds of little doggy tags prancing
round Mom’s legs, skirting all arms but hers, bonded in devotion
to her care alone, with angelic innocence, golden halo. Glittering,
smiling eyes have gone. Squeaky floors are mute. Missing Espresso,
sounds and smells are silent. The cacophony of stuffed hours
has floated away. Surrendering to the moment was easy
with three conversations bubbling for attention all at once.
Happy consociates huddled around mini-decisions,
who wants to go on a walk, when it’s nap time. Ah, nap time.
Torpor weighed in after all. Events happened, with no one bearing
singular responsibility. A snack or a nap or a laugh was shared.
Familiarity insulated us from the cold, strange world
beyond the glass windows. The den bustled with clusters
of happy commotion.

Alone now in his newly painted great
room, his mood is comforted by the warm colors, gold, orange,
deep burgundy purple. That was the idea. The gray day surrounds
us all in our pools of warm light. The garden beckons
with the answer to this sweet emptiness.
Pick up where you are and tuck away these memories
for a long winter’s night.

technorati tags- Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving poems, gratitude, garden

Touch My Soul

Infinity

Infinity

A word
with eight letters
which points
in all directions
at all times,
a zillion rubber arrows
traveling out from me
forming a sphere
of unfettered completeness.

There’s comfort
in it’s cold consistency
of Always, Forever and Everywhere;
where tomorrow
and a billion yesterdays
are still and always original,
where toast popping up
warm and crusty brown,
calling for butter
to melt into into it’s textures,
is always there
waiting to be eaten.

And time
does not pass
through an hourglass
but spins
back into itself
like a huge, pink gyroscope
floating in my heart,
telling me
I’ll never be dead
only scattered.

This empty moment
as I stare out the window,
is neither here nor there,
is full of every molecule
in history, is
a fresh Fudgesicle
which never melts,
which tastes like
orange jello
or caramel pudding
or any flavor I imagine.

When I feel infinite
I expand like a red balloon
to engulf my mother’s
birth and death
my grandpa’s pain
my sister’s spinning
clutch of daily strain.
I cover them all
with endless adoration
even though I may never
see them again.

My fear sits
in my body
but I fear it not,
for it is a tender baby
to be caressed
and held lightly aloft
by my big, bulging
garnet jello heart.

I flow into my seat
and ride in my jello car
around mountains which
melt in a few billion years.
I slip down glaciers
a mile every century
and crawl up on muddy
banks with amphibian feet.
I fly over seas which boil
and then cool to salty abysses.
I breath through tree leaves
and drip sap to the forest
floor, where I compost
and form the carbon
jewel sold at the diamond store.
I ride up through the atmosphere
on a thought full of helium
and burn in a second
before visiting Luna
as a magnificent crater
is bursted open
by a star chip flying in
from infinite space.
I rage from the magma
bold belches of earth,
over the molten
eras which brew at her core.

Lime yellow jello time
wiggles around
me, in my ears
and nose, tickly
movements back
and forth, always
here and there
and never far
from Andromeda
or the Pleiades
Sisters seven stars.

When I return to my seat
in front of this screen,
the sun’s long shadows
have tuned evening’s chord
down a notch to a purple melody.

I smile an infinite smile
and no one knows who I am
but they do know, they do!
If they could just see what I can.

Technorati tags- Infinity, poem

Jingle Ironies

A day can seem like forever born,
a year but a passing shadow.
Ten hours in a car to nowhere, forlorn,
stellar travel just out on the patio!

There’s a feast before us, ready to consume,
yet the largest, glitziest package may be hollow
while the tiny, cardboard box may perfume
long winter nights with dreams one can follow.

A world in a word, sealed with a kiss,
yet years mayn’t ever heal a kiss wounded.
Who’s to say what the meaning is, ’til
you see that “you’ve got to choose it!”

Jingle ironies or love’s frivolity, it’s
not with whom, but how we share life, clearly.
Be gentle by your spirit and kindle its fortitude.
Share with those who might need it so, dearly.

technorati tags- Christmas poems, friendship poems

Siegfried Idyll

Go and be the breeze
whispering over grassy
silk waves atop verdant,
elegant hills. Rest there
among the familiar tales
of sun ripe Riesling grapes
pearled along the plunging slopes
of castle views over river Rhine.
Go and taste the resilience
of Teutonic history, rising
and falling against the maelstrom
of Viking invaders. Go and
rebuild from scratch what you
know is good and right. Dwell in
the fecund soil of steady passion.
Find skin by the wind.
Find fruit in your heart.
Taste the lambent anodyne
smiling through
sweet, golden wine.

This goes out to my crushes. You know who you are.

tags- Riesling, Rhine