YOU - A CEREMONY OF THEIR OWN

YOU - A CEREMONY OF THEIR OWN

(Jess and Saul thought they were alone)

Overheard by father of the bride

As Saul proclaimed and Jess replied.

You are the tick to my tock.

You are the pendulum of my clock.

You make time stand still.

You make time fly and thrill.

You fulfill me and make me complete.

You still me and calm my heartbeat.

You show me how purity looks.

Your picture’s under integrity in guidebooks.

You teach me with gentle decree.

Your touch tells me it’s okay to be me.

Your loving helps me love myself more.

Your loving shows me a me I never saw before.

The way you love me, I could not help but love you.

The way you love me, there’s nothing else I could do.

Our wish for you:

Abundant happiness,

A life full of love

And a love full of life.

ULYSSES’ RETURN HOME

We learn when we feel lost

Finding our way isn’t free and

Growing pains are no small things,

We ache from the inside out.

Must the ocean always be calm?

No sailor is tested by a soft breeze.

We find out only in the storm 

Who we are and how we bend.

The hardening of one’s soul

Comes from bruising blows.

Slowly we learn life isn’t trying to be fair;

It’s a blind and deaf teacher.

Our tears will dry.  Pain will pass.

Lessons learned are small solace,

But they are all we have, our  badges,        
Ribbons we wear like tenderfoot scouts.

SARAH’S LAMENT

You old fool 
Dying not knowing

I loved you.

I never told you

Cause I wanted

More from you,

More attention

And tenderness,

More of what

My father

Never told me,

My mother

Never gave me,

More arms

Wrapping me

When I was

Most unlovable.

What I missed

I wanted most, and

What I wanted most,

I could not give.

How unfair to you.

How cold you must

Have thought me.

REPAIRS

                                    The sign over his garage door proclaims

BEACH CHAIRS CAREFULLY REPAIRED.

Each morning he opens the garage door and

Sits in front on a sturdy one waiting for customers.

A grey neighbor lady yearning company

Brings him an old chair in terrible shape,

Says, “You can have it for parts, no charge.

Tell me, what are you doing for dinner?”

Two young boys who have to live with their grandmother

Show him a rusty red chair they found on the curb.

He offers them each a quarter, but they want a dollar.

He compromises. He’ll give them a dollar next time.

It’s been ten years since his trusted partner,

The wife he thought he could never win, died.

For three months he cried by day and sobbed by night   

Until he could no longer take the sulfuric pain.

He’d have to decide, either become a drunk,

He could afford vodka, enough for that,

Or find a way of staying sober, keeping busy,

Useful, and not embarrassing himself.

So he put up his sign and now sits and waits

For people to come to him who need repair,

But, he collects parts mostly and smiles, almost

Contently, in front of his open garage door.

MY MOTHER’S SMILE

I spent a lifetime

Looking for my mother’s smile.

I picture a toddler crawling into a room,

His mother sees him and

Her eyes light up, a smile erupts.

It’s spontaneous, but

I’m not him and that’s

Not my mother.

Mine held me lightly on her lap

So I wouldn’t crush her ruffled dress.

Other times, my dirty hands and face

Were kept at a distance,

So was the rest of me.

It’s hard to love yourself

When the part of you called mother

Loves best from behind a wall.                          

Her outstretched arms

May not have been

Long enough

To cross the open space

Between us,

But her smile could have

Had she been willing.                       

Had she been able.

Now she’s gone and

The distance between us

Is even greater, so

I picture in my mind

Her smiling at me

With an approving nod.

I know I’m lying to myself,

But it’s a good lie.

SNAIL

                                                           There are times I

Feel like a snail.

If you look

For me and fail,

It’s likely because

My tiny nose

Only comes up to

The top of your toes.

Although we can’t

Walk together

We could talk together

Sharing a story

Or two about how

You once felt blue,

How you wept and wept

Over secrets poorly kept.

You should know this,

I have a hard shell,

I know not to gossip,

I simply won’t tell.

I come from a family of

Honorable snails

Who won’t ever share,

Other people’s tales.

more poetry at

SEA GLASS PEOPLE

SEPTEMBER’S WAIL

My summer love,

Like warm sand and soft skin

Turned brown by a burning sun,

Gave a last kiss for all that’s been,

A parting act for a love she’s undone.

September’s call,

A wounded man’s wail,

Autumn’s chill has just begun,

Reluctantly, I set my mainsail

Untying my knots one by one.    

Shorter days

Give more time for sleep,

Time for love stories to be respun.

Alone, in my room, I sometimes weep,

Mine's a sonnet about a hit-and-run. 

more poetry at:

SEA GLASS PEOPLE

PARAMECIUM DON’T DO IT

                                   Paramecium do not write poetry,

Rhesus monkeys recite no clever rhymes,

Neither knows much about alliteration,

At least they don’t cheat or commit crimes.

They may not care about poetic license,

Nor ability to compose loving verse,

They only do what nature has written,

They don’t debate if it’s a blessing or curse.

We preach the glories of the Ten Commandments.

Still, we grope and gossip at an awful cost,

We bare false witness and covet our neighbors,

But at least we delight in Shakespeare and Frost.

If it’s true we’ve doomed ourselves to perdition,

Four stanzas can give only so much grace,

But I believe with all my primordial passion,

Poetry, can help save the human race.

LOST PIRATE GOLD

            I wanted to be a pirate

Since the 4^th grade production of Peter Pan.

All my closest friends played lost boys, but

I was a pirate, one of a lawless, loathsome crew. 

The 6^th grade boy who played Captain Hook

Was the coolest kid in the entire school.

He danced around swinging his hook.

Why couldn’t I be him?

I came home and told my parents I wanted to be a pirate.

They agreed on the condition I didn’t run away from home.

I said okay and my mother redid my room with pirate wallpaper.

When my parents made me take dance lessons,

I went as long as I also learned how to do a sailor’s jig.

In high school when my friends and I used fake ID’s

To go to bars two towns over, they’d order beers.

I only drank rum.

In college, fraternity boys were too tame.

I spent my time in bars down by the docks

Listening to sailors tell yarns of exotic places.

I graduated with honors as my parent wished

And gave them my framed diploma.

My mother told me, “Do some good with your life.”

My father made me a deal, go to law school,

Pass the bar and he’d buy me any car I wanted.

            I went, I passed and I bought a bright yellow mustang

With a black stripe down its length. I called it “Polly.”

I joined a crew of lawyers that specialized in bankruptcy.

It was a natural fit for me.  We could take a company down,

Cut its contractual obligations to shreds

And turn a substantial profit.  We were so good

I made more money than any thirty year old

Knew what to do with.

I had a gorgeous, golden-haired girlfriend. 

We cruised to distant islands and drank daiquiris

In dark bars.  She loved the jewels I gave her.

That relationship didn’t last, but each Christmas

I went home, showered my parents with gifts,

Treasures from around the world. 

I think they liked them.

They didn’t say much.

I’d spend a lot of my visit in my old room

Staring at the wallpaper, picking out

My favorite pirates like I use to,

Recalling the 4^th grade play,

Being a pirate. Now

            I wonder, when

Did I become

A lost boy?

VISITING THE WORLD TRADE CENTER TRIBUTE

Standing silently

In the viewing gallery

Staring at a wall filled with

Family pictures of faces lost,

Each different, but the same

Sharing a common fate,

A man standing near me

Saw my wet cheek,

“Did you lose someone up there?”

I knew none of them,

I knew no one who had lost any of them,

I was equally unrelated to all of them.

Did I lose someone up there?

I lost them all.

I had no reply,

I stood in silence.