Why?

This is why a bum is better than me:

He was walking by and found a bird on the street that couldn’t fly,

And he didn’t ask it why.

He picked it up

And stood by the door of the convenience store

Out of the wind

And held it safe til it could fly again.

And I was driving in my car,

And the gusts of wind at hurricane force

Pushed a bird out of its nest,

And it hit the top of my van.

It bounced down hard onto the ground,

And with a panic stricken face,

It cried,

And there was someone on a motorcycle right behind me,

So I didn’t stop,

But felt I had to continue on,

Because by then, the light had turned to green.

And I screamed, “Why???”

All the way to the grocery store.

“Why. Why....

Why do tiny birds have to fall from the sky?”

And why... are bums, better people than I am?

-jenn 

 If you find your natural rhythm and state,

What you love and what you hate may melt away.

Have you found your melting point?

Are you a solid, liquid, or a gas at room temperature?

I’ve studied you and seen through your charade.

Your mask is a very well made one, but

Your struggle between such polarized poles has wearied you.

Relax.

Let the hummingbird within you take over.

Hover over the glorious nectar,

And get some

Before the other hummingbirds discover

Your secret flower and appear

In the square of your evening sky

To fight you for it.

But even then, you may find

Your secret power,

You enjoy the battle.

And that—-is wonderful,

For Life is full of them.

-jenn

 Why

Who would believe in butterflies

If he or she had never seen them?

These fluttering things with painted wings

That stagger through the sky.

There’s something arresting about a butterfly,

Something, at once, so cosmically comical,

And yet, impendingly beautiful.

And while I stop to watch it, I see,

That the foundation of time is cracking beneath me.

I can’t see every flutter of the wings.

There are missing chunks of time,

And mysteriously, and suddenly, 

The butterfly has disappeared.

And when did I grow this white beard?

I was once a very young girl,

And now I am

A very old man who knows

That truly nothing can be known or understood,

Nothing bad, or nothing good,

That can not be answered by the feeling one receives 

When one sees the painted wings emerge

From the dark green leaves and swagger off pitifully into another spring.

The alluring “Why?”

The seductive “Because,”

Butterflies exist.

-jenn

 Our love it something we set on,

Like an egg,

But nothing’s ever hatched from it.

Maybe it’s just a croquet ball,

And nothing ever will.

Or maybe it’s a mango seed

We could have planted long ago,

And by now had something to show for it?

Or maybe it’s a mandrake root,

And eagerly, I cling to it,

Not knowing what to do with it,

But desperately wishing to be alone with you

To see

If something mysterious mandrakey 

Might occur between you and me.

-jenn

 I like for people to tell me I’m getting taller.

I like ridiculous things

Like wings on cats

And lips on birds

And synthetic filament horsehair strings.

I like to pull the bow across a fiddle full of them

With a rattle snake rattle on the end of the bow,

And listen to the prale and prattle

As the violin gossips and threatens its jaunts.

“Oh where are you going, and where have you been?” I sing.

“And what ridiculous things have you seen?”

And the sea shanty comes, with its finely spun tale,

And only the spirit can interpret the tongues

So that I can behold them with glee,

And my mind’s greedy eye can feed me,

And I can grow taller.

Promise you’ll never stunt my growth!

Rather, verily, speak this oath to me!

That you will never, ever withhold

The stories and songs and poems

From times of old and the prophecies 

Of things to come,

Ridiculous things to come.

-jenn

 Black Bird Ode

A large gathering of black birds

In the still bare trees of almost spring,

I heard them from several blocks away.

And as I rounded the bend, I saw them,

All dressed very sharply in black,

Swaying with the branches, 

In the raucous March wind.

It wasn’t a funeral, for it wasn’t a dirge they sang.

More like an ode, praising the glory

Of metallurgy.

And occasionally, they’d utter a screech

That might curdle ones blood,

Like someone pulling someone else’s fingernails 

Down a chalkboard.

But I just shook my head

And kept on my way.

I had the urge to say

That after the winter the world’s had so far,

Even the singing of crows sounds good today.

-jenn

 While We Were Sleeping 

A nap is just a mini-death.

I welcome it.

I lie down willingly 

And give my life away.

And if my dreams are filled with desert sunrises

And rattlesnakes,

I’ll hold onto your hand as if 

I’m not the only person there,

That lives in that strange world.

And if I wake

And see the world has gone to hell

While I have slept,

I’ll hold your hand

And look around and wonder 

In awe of the things

That people make out of life,

When everything else was a possibility, too.

-jenn