The Last Day of Summer

Gently Down The Stream Of Consciousness

Sunday afternoon driveway roar traffic in bursts, jake brake logging trucks, I hope it isn’t the one I cut off Friday afternoon, I didn’t see the school bus, and I saw the trucker’s chuckle behind his windshield, behind glass, like a painting, breezy Sunday afternoon at the park, but here no lake nor swimmers nor the same lady cast in every female role, no gentlemen in high black hats, just the cars and trucks drifting by, vacationers packed their t-shirts and plastic shoes, while wistful eyes crept to the crisp blue ocean reflecting a perfectly matching sky and now they sadly roll toward the valley,

Tomorrow is a school day.

Me, I sit, tilting back in a red metal chair among the trees just barely singed with the fire of decay. Wispy seeds, like fairies, dance around my shoulder. They kiss my knees and celebrate my unmatching socks. The deer mice watch us from their little holes and the leaves are alive with chipping squirrels and squawking jays the color of twilight. This proportion of breeze and sunshine rival the best of July’s magic. The shadows lie stretched out across the ferny clay. They creep closer to my red chair. But for now, my head is warm and the ants at my feet are doing all the work.

Watching

Dog Toy

Self Observation

I am much more polite
On the morning drive
If I take the time
To walk the yellow voilet path;
The path of bleeding hearts
And flowering wood sorrel,
To the Thump-house
And sit patiently on the wooden seat
And watch the hummingbirds
Dive-bomb the feeder
Just outside the window
While I relieve myself
Of the waste that can make me roar
Up passing lanes and around
Slow vans with
One Man One Woman stickers
And drivers with tight gray curls,
Who may pull out in front of me.

Place Feet Here

This life
Is a spitting contest
With god,
Or the devil:
Wrestling matches
With my own
Angels, or
Demons;
Two sides: Same coin.

This life
Is an apology.
I’m sorry I’m happy.
I’m sorry for my pink skin.
I’m sorry for falling down.
I’m sorry for crying in front of you.
There is always more;
Most of the sins are lost
In folds of black silk;
The fabric of your death shroud;
Lost in generations
Of DNA,
Or one thousand births;
Your choice.

This life
Is a quest.
A spiraling path
Inward.
The more I learn
To love myself,
You like me
Less,
And the less I care
What you think,
I am able to love
You more;
The more I love you,
The more you can hurt me.
The more you hurt me,
The deeper I travel
Toward myself.
Vicious cycle?

This life
Is the funniest joke,
Told badly,
Punchline untimely revealed
Stammeringly, then
Taken back.
“Let me start over.”
So much practice
In the mirror,
I can only search
For my own reflection
In your eyes and
My own mortality
Among the tiny folds
In wrinkling flesh at
The corners;
Die laughing.

isa

the
moon
stares
rudely

Winter Solstice

the mildewed darkness
flopped over the dishcloth day
dirty gray to black