September Shoes

I don't know if children still go barefoot all summer like I did.


Oh, to the beach certainly, to the pool, a little bit around the house ... but across the steaming fields? Through clover alive with bees? Across nettles and other dreaded stickers? Into town, walking all the way there (how else?) and all the way back?


I don't think so. Children today are protected in so many ways from so many things. I sometimes think it's a bit of a shame that they don't have the same freedoms we did. But it's a different world now ...


Perhaps it's just as well that they don't know the quiet agony of adjusting to shoes ... new shoes, at that ... after a summer of complete freedom ... for their feet, at least.


Excuse me, please ... I think my toes are starting to wiggle again.


The poem:



SEPTEMBER SHOES

How hot the shoes
were each September,
recapturing feet
that had run unshod
all summer, celebrating
freedoms of childhood.
Even now the memories
make my toes wiggle.

 © 1995

(originally published in Capper's)


Today's word: wiggle

Only the Best

I can't imagine being restricted to writing only one word on a given day. There are so many of them clamoring to get out of my head and go skittering across the page ... or to be posted on the screen.

On the day that I wrote this little poem, though, I must have been trying to imagine what it might be like to have to settle on just one word ... and I picked "friend," with its dictionary meaning of a person one knows well and is fond of ... plus all its other shades of meaning, depending on the reader's experience.

It has so many meanings. It conjures up images of a handshake, a hug, of sharing a conversation with someone, or just sitting quietly with them ... helping someone, being helped by someone, of someone you can trust, someone with whom you can share your thoughts ... secrets, even ... 

It seems to be an all-purpose word, but it's a very precise word, too ... not a musical word, but one that can bring "music" to us, put a spring in our step, a glow that counters even the cloudiest of days.

The poem:

ONLY THE BEST

If I could write
just one word today,
what care I'd take
to pick the best
from the great array
of "previously-owned,
runs great" words,
for example: Friend.

© 1996

(originally published in Capper's)

Today's word: friend

Making the Pitch

First of all, a confession: I was not a pitcher.

Oh, I may have tossed a softball in the general direction of a batter a few times ... in a school playground game or two ... but I was usually somewhere deep in the outfield, keeping company with the gnats, just standing around, watching the slowly unfolding action, which seemed miles away.

Then there was a summer I spent much of the time "pitching" a tennis ball against the side of the garage (good practice toward the day when I might become a real pitcher ... and quite practical, because I had nobody to catch my pitches and toss the ball back to me).

But I wasn't a pitcher. Never was. Never will be.

Still, that didn't keep me from dreaming ... or daydreaming, as in this poem. Now that I have, for all practical purposes, given the secret of the poem away ... sorry about that ... here it is: 

MAKING THE PITCH

I finger the ball, toe the rubber,
stretch and unleash my very
best pitch, watch it zooming

and dancing toward that pop
like a sudden shot against
the glove, watch the batter

standing, stunned, hear
the crowd's roar welling up,
filling the stadium, the buzz

of a fly nearby, the gentle
tinkling of ice, the hammock
swaying ever so gently.

© 2000
(originally published in Capper's)

Today's word: swaying

If Elected

Don't worry. I'm not running for office.

Honest. I'm not planning any long-winded speeches, I won't be asking for money ... or even your vote ... and I certainly won't be making any promises I can't keep. I promise you that.

Then what?

Today's poem was written at another time ... in another place ... when and where it seemed that everybody else in the whole universe was vying for a position at the public trough.

It was a time when politicians were talking our ears off ... and dogs were barking all night. What a wonderful combination, I thought ... and there's no disrespect for dogs intended in that, I assure you.

If I WERE to be elected ... to anything ... it seemed to me at the time ... I would prefer to be the officeholder responsible for "mudging" curs (whatever that means) ... not the first time that a responsibility has been invented out of pure air (remember when we still had some of that?) ... in order to garner the votes of the undecided ... and unsuspecting ...

Well, from there it was strictly downhill ... and fast. But I had fun with the poem (remember, no disrespect for dogs intended). Here it is:

IF ELECTED

When finally I have
attained full growth,
I think that I
should like to be
a curmudgeon, which,
I'm told by my pal,
clear-eyed Ed,
is one who
mudges curs.

It's the least they
deserve for barking
all night at nothing
in particular while
decent folk are
pounding pillows,
trying to sleep,
but only attaining
grouchyhoodedness.

I promise, if elected,
not to be stingy
with my curmudgeoning.
 © 1997

(originally published in Parnassus Literary Journal)


Today's word: curmudgeon

How to Reach 80

We had braved a roaring winter storm, and there we sat, celebrating an 80th birthday ... no, not mine ... a friend's.

You'll have to read the poem to share in her secret of how to achieve that venerable age ... the Big Eight-OH!

At the time I thought it was funny. I remember joining in the laughter as she revealed the "secret" ... a statement so like her. I didn't think it was very useful advice, really. Just funny.

And once I'd crept a bit closer to that mile marker, I began thinking, well, maybe ...

The poem:

HOW TO REACH 80

We ate Cajun food,
savored the singing,
all the memories
of this tiny lady
celebrating and
being celebrated
for her active life
as mother, fellow
worker, confidante,
for bringing us
sunshine on cloudy
days. And we all
leaned forward
to catch every
word as she stood,
she said, to share
her secret: "Just
keep breathing."

 © 2001

(originally published in Capper's)

Today's word: celebrating

Butterflies

So many times, it seems, poems simply come to me of their own accord. I think of them as gifts.

They are definitely gifts to me ... and I'm glad when I can share them with others.

When this one came to me, it was speaking of those poems ... and notes ... random jottings ... scribblings ... items on their way to becoming poems ... all of which I will leave behind ... as someday I must.

I don't dwell on that a lot, but the thought intrigues me ... particularly the idea of these little poems ... or the notes written on scraps of paper ... thoughts which never quite made it into poetry ... being able to flit around, like butterflies released ...

I like that mental picture.

And now, the poem:

BUTTERFLIES

Someday they'll find
these little things
I tried to write,
things that might have
become poems, had I been
able to find the words
I needed for the beauty,
the sorrow, the pain,
the joy of what they
really were. Had I just
found the words.

I hope they will turn
them loose, let them
fly like the butterflies
I always supposed them
to be, free to find
a flower, another, and
ever another, across
the sunlit valleys
of thoughtful minds.

 © 1998

(originally published in PKA's Advocate)
Today's word: sunlit

Autumn Rain

Thunderstorms were frightening to a youngster growing up in rural Southern Illinois.

They seemed so packed with fury, so unpredictable as they lashed out, leaving so much damage in their wake.

But rain, particularly a gentle rain at night, was a different matter.

I learned to listen to its comforting cadence against the windows or on the roof, to hear the music it contained.

Sometimes it was like a whisper. Sometimes a Saturday night hoedown.

But it was my kind of music. I loved going to sleep to it ... waking up to it ... or just lying there listening to it.

We forget, sometimes, what a gentle, soothing, healing sound rain can make, especially as harsh summer days begin slowly surrendering to the cooler days and cooler nights of autumn.

This poem is about that kind of rain. It was originally published in Capper's, then in my first collection, Chance of Rain, issued by Finishing Line Press, 2003:

AUTUMN RAIN

Struggling awake
to the sound
of trees scratching
at my green roof,
I see their limbs
swaying against
rolling clouds.

Dancing lightning,
slanting drops,
steady drone
of falling water;
trees, docile now,
guiding droplets
to thirsting soil,
I turn my pillow
cool side up,
go drifting off
in this cradling
sea of sound.

 © 2003

Today's word: hoedown