that's mrs. mediocrity to you

.

i want to marry earl grey and move to the mountains

live on scones and color song, dreams and folded lawn

breathe in fresh and ripple and whisper pine

.

on a raft in the center of a lake named time

.

we’ll dress the moon in ribbons and hang petals from stars

strip the sunset of orange and use it as fire

never-wait for dawn and sip the scent of every howl

.

from an island of boulder, shoulder and bone

.

to warm our toes in the quilt of forgiveness

steep our hearts in the river of revolution

soothe our skin with the afterglow of room

.

beneath our sky tent bird fingered curious home

.

.

.

.

A poem a day for 30 days, in honor of National Poetry Month.
This post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.

Also linking up with the fabulous dVerse poets for Open Link Night

i want to put your youth in my pocket
and save it for a rainy day

i want to tell you dylan thomas was brilliant
and bob dylan was his love child

i want to tell you to listen

but i know you won’t hear anything i say
with my cloak of old age singing me
invisible to you and your friends

i want to tell you nothing kills you but death
not heartbreak or disappointment
failure or ridicule
loss or even down and out

even so
you will die a tiny bit every day

in the same way a tree dies every time
a leaf drops

and a mirage gives up when you see it

but you

and me

we’re all dandelions

growing where we land

sending down our tap root of survival
blooming garishly bright
and then withering grey

and even when we’re spent

there are seeds

to catch a ride on a breeze
and carry us
into tomorrow

so i hold my tongue
because you are young
and i’m just the sun
holding court
with yesterday’s clouds

.

.

.

.

A poem a day for 30 days, in honor of National Poetry Month.
This post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.

Also linking up with the fabulous dVerse poets for Open Link Night, join us!

i broke my arm when i was eleven
getting out of the bathtub (don’t laugh)
where i’d been reading
for hours i’m sure
and knowing me, i probably still had
my nose in my book when i stepped out
and caught my foot on the edge of the

faucet

went down hard and hit my upper arm
against the corner of a cabinet
cracking my humerus (it wasn’t funny)
and yeah, it hurt like hell
but nothing looked broken and
i was always falling
tripping, running into walls clumsy
my middle name

three days later i still hadn’t
seen a doctor
no one at fault i just didn’t act
the way a girl with a broken
arm would
and anyway pain is always a guessing

game

but eventually, my mom suspecting
an x-ray was ordered
and i remember
being just a little bit silently glad
because there would be
six weeks of no chores for me
(stupid dishes)
and i had a stack of books to

read

.

.

.

A poem a day for 30 days, in honor of National Poetry Month.
This post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.

Also linking up with the fabulous dVerse poets with anecdotes for Poetics, join us!

i have seven mirrors in my house and they all
tell the same story

but none of them is true

i drink tea and water and wine
and then you remember

we have not eaten

hunger fills the dark with daydreams
and i open a window so we can listen

to the emptiness of fortitude

you turn your back to me and
shift position to look

for a moon that has not risen

hours later you are asleep and i see her
reflection in the looking glass of silence

but i don’t wake you

.

.

.

.

A poem a day for 30 days, in honor of National Poetry Month.
This post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.

Also linking up with the fabulous dVerse poets for Open Link Night, join us!

for surely
something wonderful
is about to happen

the sun will set
and color will come home

the moon will rise
and stars will dance with midnight

a seed will burst through the soil
a leaf will unfold
a flower will open
an egg will divide

somewhere, a face cracks into a smile
somewhere else, tears are falling

and in all the miles between
anger and silence and joy and rhythm
form a quilt of square and triangle
rectangle and hexagon
inviting you to settle under
snuggle into
cover over

the rich dark soil underneath
wet and dank and teeming with
worms turning
turn turn

a darkness that feeds you
through the hollow cave of night

until morning comes and warms you
with promises promises
of another day

another chance
to sit there

watching

stand there

waiting

for surely
something wonderful

is about to happen

.

.

.

.

Linking up today with the fabulous dVerse poets for Open Link Night, join the fun!

if i had known it was you
on the corner that night

all staggered and cerulean blue
spinning me blindly
with a bump to my shoulder
down a dark-sided rocky path

i would have turned back
and taken your hand

filled it with bread
and boxes of paint

covered the mirrors
and sold you on hope

written you ‘cross the sky
in one long blinding comet

and then reached for your ankles
so you couldn’t float away

.

but your path was set
long before you were born

an arched trajectory
of red ochre
burnt umber
alizarin crimson

left to trail behind you
in the stare of eternity’s night

while i wander this path
in the darkness, this ever blinding
always wanting
mars black shadow hole
of crow and star and

listening

always listening

for the echo
of your footsteps

.

..

.

Linking up today with dVerse poets for Poetics
(on interactions with historical people)

we’re always looking for something to ground us
a way to tattoo ourselves onto existence

indelible ink wash rivers
flowing through veins of indecision

brushing all sharp edges into
smooth curves and blurred remembrance

fitting pieces together in a nest of silt at the bottom
while the corners get washed downstream

memory is a gazing pool of fortitude
what we forget is the skeleton of living

winter freezes everything that runs

.

.

.

.

Linking up today with the fabulous dVerse poets for Open Link Night, join the fun!

i have rosa parks on one eye
and an apple in the other

and that’s not even counting how many
flags it took to paste my mouth shut,
a whole row of forever sealed with love

to keep me quiet because letters
are filled with absence and whispers
and the check is always in the mail

but even grand central station
can’t keep up with a butterfly
that hovers just this side of blue

and your two cents
well, it will cost a whole lot more
to be heard nowadays

in this world of press on policies
and plastic outrage refusing to fit into
one ounce or seven at quarter past eleven

and the gavel of discretion
bangs down hard on my temple,
this ruin of time so fragile

but not at all hazardous
or containing anything liquid
restricted or red tape perishable

just a kaleidoscope of flowers
for corner decoration and
one way philatelistic passage

when all you have to do
is write

.

.

.

Linking up today with the fabulous dVerse poets for Open Link Night

is always drawn through tears
on the tails of falling stars

and just like the pleiades
cannot be seen
if you stare directly

but only exists
in the corner of your eye
or someone else’s

just a habit whisper
phantom ghost
heard only at midnight

and in the after echo
of the twelve stroke
dissonant chime

the silhouette
of negative space
is deafening

.

.

.

.

Linking up today with the fabulous dVerse poets for Open Link Night

life keeps raining down around me
even as i close my eyes in a vain attempt to hide
even as i refuse to see anything but beautiful
even as i say goodbye and goodbye and goodbye

and i listen to the music of the weather you
bring to me in a jar the color of sea

i listen to spring creeping in just beneath
winter’s worn grey tattered dress

i listen to the sound of
………….another year dying
………….another heart trying
………….another eye crying

my palms turned upward to catch diamond drops
………….and bits of glitter that will leave with the sun

there is more light than you can see
………….more hope than you can harness
………….more time than you can shelter

and there is less of you
………………..less of me
………………………….less of yesterday

in this puddle building up around my ankles
….this ocean of silence that roars in my ears
….this river that runs straight to the cave of your heart

….this avalanche that keeps raining down

……………………………..raining

………………………down

…………………around

……………………………..me

..

.

.

.

Linking up today with the fabulous dVerse poets for Open Link Night