Mixed Moss

I don’t write poetry. But sometimes, it writes istelf. Every once in a while, it just overtakes me– and out it comes. Dripping from my pen, as it were. This page is to catch my drips. After all, the most brilliant plans and songs are always written on napkins in a bar or a restaurant, right?

This generally happens when I am blue, so cheerful poetry is not a large part of my repretoire– and what there is, isn’t very good. So please don’t think I’m this emo all the time. Oh, one of them is more of a song. Only there isn’t any music.You’ll know which one it is.

I’m not afraid anyone will steal these, because frankly they aren’t any good, but please, justify my faith in your good taste by asking permission before you use them.  

Where I Want to Be
Loose
Floating
Cut adrift
Slowly meandering through time and space
No end in sight
No end insight
Destination unknown
A minute ago I was there
and now…
I am not yet here
and no longer there
in short I am not anywhere.
Left
with no words to express
and my only rhyming scheme
like Dr. Seuss in a Tim Burton dream.
(It isn’t even very good
I bend my lines like stiff hardwood–
reluctantly they do my will.)

Will.
Your will?
Do I do it?
Have I even paused to ask it?
Or simply do my own and mask it
like a poisoned apple in snow white’s basket
it looks lovely but puts me in a casket.
Me and you both.
You died. For me.
The least I can do is to respect
your last will and testament.
Yet here I sit and scribble away
and waste your time day after day
in unsophisticated words
and bumbling meter
surely there’s a better way.
Do you grow impatient?
Is my time up on my cosmic parking meter,
my ticket filled out by St. Peter?
(and people think City of Chicago fines are steep–
eternal ones aren’t exactly cheap!)
And it is not I but you who must pay
Proving once again that yours is the better way.

There is a place I want to be
(Is getting there up to you or me?)
Where, like Frankie, I can safely say
I did it my way
and yet with Jesus Christ, your son
say not my will but yours be done.
Will there ever come
a day when your will and mine are one? 

One Night
Child of darkness
Child of war
No silver lining in this storm
How precarious is your fight
How precious is your light
What tragedy that it might
Go out
One night.
If I flout
Convention;
If I shout
Your name into the wind
Of media
Will it be heard?
Can my love help me learn
To give you a name, a face
For all to see and hear?
Am I too shy
Under the night sky?
My timidity mystifies:
Not I they come for, but you.
Do I fear your loss the way I ought?
If you are caught,
One night
On your walk with danger frought
Will you be mute?
No— I will speak
On behalf of the weak.
And I will stand in the stark, harsh light
Of the public eye
For those who take refuge each night
In long commutes to hospital wings
Angels’ wings
Safety on a cold hard floor
Miles from home.
I will roam
My city streets as well
One night.
I will wrap
A blanket ‘round my back
And shiver in the cold
For those not as old
As I.
Huddled in the rain
Clinging to what courage remains
To me
And those huddled with me.
Courage to stand up for Right
For just one night—
One just night.
And reflected in the mirror of love,
Your invisible light
Will again shine out bright
Strong enough to cast a shadow
For one night.
Can there be
A shadow of a doubt of our success?
No—
A shadow of a hope.
Tonight
We are all
Night commuters.
 

Hell and High Water

As a kid, the monsters under the bed weren’t real
But now that I’m older there’s still fear to feel
And this time the fear just might be justified.

You see, I’m afraid to tell the truth;
Not everyone in the world’s a friend like Ruth.
Can I trust you now? And if you go away will I ever trust again?

We can laugh and we can play
But in the end I always run away
For fear of being discovered and exposed.

We can talk about an Ark of stuff
But still never get beyond cotton candy fluff;
In the end I put it off until another day.

Throw a dart, win a prize
And when the dart hits home, never look in your eyes
I’ve won! But what did my carnival teddy bear cost?

Arms’ distance is the place for me
A your-dance-space my-dance-space philosophy
But deep inside all I want is to be close.

I’m afraid to move another step
To the left or right or straight ahead
And I can’t go back ‘cause time, like a chess board has its rules

So I hide in a dark room in my heart
And when I come out I read a script, play a part:
The clever, sarcastic woman who has never cried.

I’ve boarded up the windows and readied supplies
And now I cower and wait inside
For the hurricane to hit, the storm to strike

Surrounded by the lies I’ve told
With nothing but a teddy bear to hold
Four walls to keep in fear and out everything I like.

The ultimate truth I’ve already seen
You’d think that it would set me free
But any lie or fear is enough to keep me inside.

Part of me hopes it falls down around my ears
This shack I’ve constructed with cardboard and tears
I’d have nothing left, but then at least I’d be out.

You see, Hell has already come
But maybe high water would save me from
The personal New Orleans I’ve built.

A helicopter, of grace a proof
Might pluck me from the roof
Of the drowning house I made from my feelings of guilt.

Will you rescue me for love’s sweet sake
Once you’ve found out I’m a liar and a fake?
This is a game where there are no hard and fast rules.

And can I be strong and can I be brave
And will it all be enough to save
My soul? If not I’ll have played us both for fools.

But it doesn’t matter where I roam
I know I’ll never have a home
Until someone knows me and loves me anyway.

Come hell or high water will love wade through?
I just need to know what’s true.

 

 

Stupid Proving Smart

Just a stupid piece of paper.
From a fancy tree in some Northwoods acre
But it’s all it took, it seems
To come between you and me.

A sea of time
As the hall clock chimes
And I’m stuck eternally eating limes
In silence
With no lemonade this time
Waiting for something to materialize
Hoping for some compromise
What was our crime, yours and mine?

Four years, a measly part
in the four score years of life
For us to spend apart;
but four years caused us strife.

You don’t know me any more
And your efforts have been poor
To meet me once again
To my chagrin.
When was the last time you even listened?

You might as well be only a heart beat away
You might as well be light-years away

I suppose it’s water under the bridge
But don’t you miss me just a smidge?

Those papers claim that we are smart
But I think that they broke my heart
We’re worlds apart
And if I’m so smart
how come I can’t reach you?

Just three tears I’ll allow:
One for my rejection,
One for my pain,
And one for that which might have been.

Three things I know;
Three things are true
Love is the most powerful force in the universe
Regret the most difficult thing to reverse
And the distance between those who once were close, the most difficult one to traverse.

 

—– 

Poison
Willful poison.
Murderer.
You’ve killed your own—
and you’re not alone.
You’ve killed your dignity–and worse,
you’ve let others kill mine
and not said a word cause you don’t have a spine.
Well, I do.
So now I say to you:
Stand up
stand strong
be a man.
(a real man,
‘cause they’ll lie to you about what a man is, if they can.)
Don’t tell me how hard it is
don’t tell me I don’t know what it’s like
don’t tell me they’re your friends—you’re just their pet clown
and they’ll keep you down as long as the poison’s around
for their amusement.
Don’t tell me they’re girls and you wanna be polite
just do it, do what’s right.
Do it now—tonight.
Before the blight,
the poison creeps into my soul on account of your fight.
I know it sounds trite,
but dammit, be a light.

 

—–

A Leader’s Prayer

The sun rises
it’s another day
and I am waiting
for what you will say.

I wait on you, Father
I’m tired and weak
and I won’t leave this place
until you speak.

(You say)
Come let me show you
how to live.
Come let me give you
what you must give.
Come to me child and sing what I sing
As I show you the world from my sheltering wing
As I show you the world from my sheltering wing.

Give me your heart
teach me to say
words of kindness and love
to those on my way.

Give me the patience
that comes of faith.
I rest in your hands,
but I need to hear you say

Come let me show you
how to live.
Come let me give you
what you must give.
Come to me child and sing what I sing
As I show you the world from my sheltering wing
As I show you the world from my sheltering wing.

You are my rest and peace,
in you my strength lies;
and I find faith to go on
when you show me my life through your eyes.

Come, Lord, and show me
how to live.
Come, Lord, and give me
what I must give.
I come as your child, I’ll sing what you sing
as you show me the world from your sheltering wing.
Please show me the world from your sheltering wing.

—–

Death of the Fairy Tale

There it lay in jagged shards about my feet:
My shattered vision of what wasn’t.
Rosy-hued like glasses, a stained-glass image of my life
Conceptions of myself, my God, my Love in bitter fragments, too.
Woe to she who sleeps too long, too deep, wakes too late
Wakes to find her world has slipped through her fingers
And shattered like her fragile heart into a thousand pieces.
Where is the cosmic super glue to piece this brittle life together?
What would Cinderella have done
If her glass slippers had cracked?

 

—–

Hurricane

Wind surrounds
Angry rain pounds
Wound
Tight as a spring
The tiger-like thing
Crouches waiting to pounce
Sure to trounce
Spinning ever tighter
About the tiny fighter
Hopeless and valiant
Our hero stands defiant
And that hero is me
Trembling like a leaf
Helpless to ward off the blow
As my desperation grows
Heart racing too fast, mouth too dry
And not even strength enough to cry;
A huddled and a shivering mass
Of humanity (which means made of glass).

Oh Lord who gave me
This, your sword
A mighty and a powerful gift
That I must somehow learn to lift,
Keep me warm
Through my storm.

—–

The Tiny World

The tiny world spins on and on
upon a gossamer string of stars;
a cosmic superball for the gods
erratically bouncing back and forth.
A wild ride with highs and lows
like an earthquake rocks my world,
shakes my dishes from their shelves
and shifts the furniture in the rooms of my life.
Uncertainty unsettles me
and on the floor surrounded by
the disordered remains of my so-called life,
I reflect on the events that have shown me
Myself on a new path—of opportunity.
A path of joy, a path of pain,
of harder work, of equal strife? 

—–

Summer Storm 

Torn!
Torn!
All is torn

A shudder and a rumble
Shake the clouds
A bolt of lightening
Streaks down
Air is rent
With angry voices
The hot and silent
Afternoon is torn

Torn!
Torn!
All is torn
How can I continue on
With my thoughts and tears
Littered like beer cans
And toys on the lawn?
You are gone
The suitcase clicked
The baby cried
The screen door creaked
The baby cried
The engine revved off down the street
The baby cried
And I
I crumpled up inside
My heart tore in two
And exploded like a bag of skittles
On the floor
The skies opened and began to pour
Tears
And the child inside me cried
Torn!
Torn!
All is torn.

—–

Fireworks

Bang
crackle
pop-pop-pop
sparkle.
Splash of color in the sky
a spark reflected in my eye
fireworks in air and heart
just one touch can make them start
is this like that or that like this
and what will it mean if we kiss
goodnight?
You know we might.
Are we right,
or is it just the light
from city, from sky tonight?