weekly muse...
volume 1, issue 23 | 2022-12-28
poetry
insomnia
earnest made up faces urge me to buy anyone awake this late must need something fan blades turn all night a twin engine plane at first light newspapers strike the driveways like thudding bombs up and down the street
-- from homebound
baggage claim
we circle like wagons watching bags hide ourselves within then wheel them off like turtles dragging shells are there no things where we are going?
-- from along the way
advent
where is the pregnant mary bulging belly sculpt in stone is there fruit without a womb?
-- from everything rhymes
fossil hunting
-- for james hutton, founder of modern geology the boy who once would be a man has come again to limestone cliffs and faces pocked with fossil scars marine life’s last remains, like lost wax castings left behind two thousand feet above sea level * * * ossuaries of their own bones engraved lives preserved in slime by the same force of constant pressure, upheaval and time that held their demise each one kept a natural history of itself impression and expression, etched in exquisite detail * * * fanned lines stamped in awe on his craggy brow deepen and spread in fractured layers of cracked shale, until little else remains but empty shells thrust up from below with patient stones as he wanders the cliffs searching them
-- from lives of the poets
twilight scene
lightning bugs still wink at night yet some of the wonder fades with the years with everything in its place another day -- from another day
short stories
sideview mirror
-- coming next…
-- from signs & wonders
lucy (losing the light)
…continued
“Hi Lucy!” Keryl was confused. “You have class today?”
“Tomorrow.” I explained. “I’m just here to pick up the schedule.”
“But you start school next week?”
I loved the sweet lilting sound of her Indian accent. It struck me as humble, how she made every statement come out like a question.
“Yeah. That’s the point.” I scowled. “I’ll have to juggle my classes.”
“You’re such a hard worker?” Keryl praised. “I’m amazed.”
She was the one who amazed me—raising two young kids on her own, holding this place together with paper clips and glue. Sure, we had other workers, an executive director even. But, Keryl was the heart of the ‘Y’. She kept it going. She was the warm air in the sauna, the cool water in the pool.
“Sometimes a girl’s gotta do…” I shrugged.
“...what a girl’s gotta do.” She chimed in. It was one of our rituals. Like quiet cheerleaders in our own game.
Keryl’s large brown eyes looked past me to Mr. Davidson over my shoulder.
“Keryl, this is Paul Davidson, my itinerant photography teacher.” I turned to him. “Mr. Davidson, this is Keryl, queen of the roost.” Then turned back to her. “He’s going to make me take your picture now. So you might as well smile and get it over with.”
Mr. Davidson shrugged his shoulders with both palms up in a gesture as if to say, ‘I don’t know what she’s talking about, but let’s humor her.’
Keryl grinned and leaned her elbows on the glass counter between us. I was already inside the lens, underwater. Her image filled my view as I paddled closer. Bright teeth filled her wide-open smile with a string of pearls. Short brown hair capped her head like a seaweed wreath. The bronze skin of her full round face radiated warmth like bricks on a sunny day. She wore her bright red pullover shirt with the grace of a sovereign robe. She is a queen, I now realized. Royal mother of kindness. My sister, my queen.
-- to be continued…
-- from summer’s end
microfiction | a history of the world
…continued
worship (wooden ships)
My knees ache. My back is stiff. I squirm in this itchy suit. For all eternity. To kneel in this pew. Tortured by wood. I cannot endure.
Beneath stained glass, a window slat, cracked open to my view. Outside, are sunshine and grass. Soft green grass that tickles my face.
Stand. Kneel. Sit. Kneel. Mumble. Punch my chest.
The standing hurts almost as bad. I fix my eye on the crack. One day, I will fly out that window and never come back. Like the bird in the stained glass.
-- to be continued…
-- from a history of the world