The McDonald's drive-thru is aligned
So that, at. 9:16 am,
As I wait in line to order,
The sun and I are face to face.
It's cloudy today,
And like a smoked lens,
The weather allows me look at the sun
And in this veiled way,
To see it as the star it truly is
On this, the solstice morning.

I remember one of the only best friends I ever had
Brought me a Christmas present.
Her whole family came to my house
And watched me open it.
It was in a big cowboy boot box,
Unwrapped, and I thought it might be boots,
But as I lifted off the lid,
I smelled oranges.

They all watched my face expectantly,
And I smiled, and thanked them for the oranges.
I was five. My best friend was six.

And the oranges were delicious,
They may have been all the way from California,
But all my life, I've gotten strange gifts,
And mostly what they've always taught me is:
You can't have what you want.

Until you.

Because,
You are what I want,
And I'm thankful for you,
And you give me such beautiful gifts.
You are the meaning of Christmas to me.
You've shown me
I CAN have what I want,
And that is the most powerful liberation
I've ever received.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.

-jenn

Everybody just wants to go home,
Especially when you're sick.
Sometimes it's a long way,
The roads aren't paved,
And to get to the road, there are lots of gates.

There's a difference between country  mice
And their city cousins.
Country mice know some gates are hard for women to open,
And that you've got to shut it back
So the cows don't get out,
And the horses.

They want out baaaaaaad.
I've had to face a charging horse
And hit it just right with my jutsu,
Knock it to the ground
And wallow with it down in the dust
While some fool fumbled with the gate.

I should have shut the gate,
And let him fumble with the horse.

But like I say,
Everybody just wants to go home,
Whatever that is.

-jenn

In this abhang, everything is part of the poem.
Even the unpoetic parts, even the nights
When no one sleeps,
That too, is part of the
Communitarian journey.

Fear is the only thing that stops Love.
Hate is not its opposite.
Ennui is never part of it,
But only fear creates a push that blocks Love's flow.

Love doesn't push well.
Love doesn't pull.
It plays nice with others
In a team sport, like
Unsynchronized swimming, or
Free-style dancing in the park,
Not tit for tat,
But I'll scratch your back,
And you can scratch mine, too,
If you want to.

I see you do.
Now that's sooooooo sweeeet.
That's Love.

-jenn

When the sky is Flatley grey,
So much so that the streetlamps have to stay
On all morning and into the afternoon,
And the trees have lost their leaves
So that all you see of them
Is dull gray brown bark and branches,
Black and wispy and thin against the blank.
Then don't forget your coat and hat,
And wrap your neck up nice and tight,
And after that, remember
To don your smile,
And let your eyes shine for a while on me,
For theirs is the only hue that moves me
Thru the holler days,
And the cold drear of December.

-jenn

Eight oaken magi attend my birth.
They stand silently and observe
Something born again in me today.
They bring their gifts:
Attentive eyes,
Adoring coos, grateful sighs,
That I am healthy and complete.
They bring frankincense and myrrh
And gold and leave them at my feet,
And new fire is kindled deep inside of me.
My cells regenerate again today,
And I am alive and here to stay
For a bit longer.
I celebrate all this in me,
All this in you,
Divine life coursing through us.
We rejoice in laughs and smiles,
Offer each other Peace,
Goodwill, and Love, and Happiness,
Beautifully aware of Incarnation renewed in us Today.

-jenn

When that shiny black Kia Sorrento passes by
At 9:35 on a Sunday morning,
And without warning, I see Ken and Barbie
Ensconced within,
So perfectly coiffed and arranged,
And even the whoosh of their vehicle by
Gives me a whiff of the latest millennial version of Aqua Velva.

I see the beady eye of that Kia
Menacing, promising me that it will take me to church too,
Someday, just a little while longer.

But I've just walked a mile and a half with you, God,
And I wouldn't trade that for anything.

-jenn

The sling was invented by a man
Who put his hand in his pocket
While his arm was out of socket
And noted the relief.
And when the man got home he found
The underdrawers that he had on
Beneath his outer britches
Had no pocket, but some slits with stitches
That allowed him better to pee.
But with his outer britches off,
He found his pocket also doffed,
And his arm hung limp and he screamed in pain
Until he pulled his underbreeks
Up to his chin and slang his sore arm tnru.
And this all worked fine
Until his wife came in from the butcher shack
And found him in this matter-of-fact way,
And in her alacrity and pragmatic sense
Of his calamity and her defense
Of such a sight in her kitchen,
She took up a bodkin and sliced off a piece of her own petticoat
And fashioned him a proper sling
That he could wear with anything
Whether pocketed or not,
Until his arm healed up right and righteously.

-jenn

Sometimes Karma is delayed,
And just when you think you've done something good,
Like rescue a baby cat
From the jaws of a pembroke corgi,
And you lay your head down on a pillow,
And someone jerks said pillow
Right out from under your melon head,
And your head takes a one inch bloop
Down onto your mattress,
And you hear someone say,
"THAT'S MY PILLOW!"

Then you know you will have to wait
A little while longer for what goes around
To come around,
Or..... Do you?
That is YOUR pillow, afterall!

-jenn

Energy is the ability to do work.
"Shirk" is the ability to slide your work
Up off of you and onto some other fool.
And work is good.
And shirk is too,
When you feel your soul getting slack,
And you see that last straw
Heading for your camel's back.

Tis better to shirk and run away
For a day,
Than to break in half
And be laid up
And outta work the rest of yore natural born life.

-jenn

Last night, while I waited outside your house
For your wife to go to sleep,
I got sleepy,
And to stay awake,
I went through your mail.
I had taken it with me, like a monkey,
Up into the branches of a sycamore,
But your mail was as boring as mine is.
When I finally saw all your lights go off in your house,
I climbed down,
But a limb snagged my vest,
And hung me out to dry,
A package stuck in a fork of the tree.
The rest of your mail went fluttering down
Like falling leaves.

That's when your neighbors across the street
Heard the clatter and turned their porch lights on.
Just about then the branch I was snagged on snapped,
And I fell, flat on my back on the ground.

I lay there smiling, happy to be alive,
Staring up through the sycamore
At the bright stars shining down,
While your neighbor man yelled into the night
At "You damn kids!" And a few other vagrant unnamed miscreants.

He went back in and turned off his lights
And I stood up, dusted myself off,
Picked up all your scattered mail,
And then I noticed that one package
That had stuck up in the tree out of my reach.

I jumped up and grabbed a branch
And tried to swing up and knock it down.
The branch cracked and made a rather loud pop,
And your neighbor's lights came back on.
I swung my feet up just as the branch broke
And stood up in the fork of the tree
Like a possum.
I watched your neighbor storm
Out his front door and down his front steps
And across the street
And right over to where I was.

I jumped down out of the tree
And landed at his feet.
He began to lecture me and I proceeded to give him a cussing.
I told him I was only trying to help you get your mail.
He was tall, and so he simply reached up
And took the package down for me.
He must've thought all my dirty talk was talkin' dirty,
For quietly now, and like a knight,
He bent at the waist to bow to me,
And then, went to one knee
As if to propose,
And said, "At your service, Ma'am."

And then he asked if he could take me to IHOP.

Well I tell you all this to say,
That if your mail looked a bit disheveled,
It may or may not have been through a lot last night.

-jenn

You delight me in person
You draw me from afar
You dazzle me in the company of others

Your love dawns on me
And warms my heart
Makes me shine

You do it all
And did I mention,
You delight me in person...

-jenn

I'm a lover.
It's what I do.
And if I fight,
I only fight for love.
I fight for you.
I love for you, too,
From way over here
On the shores of my soul,
Where love laps up
High on the sand,
Like the socks I pull up
High on my thighs, and the boots I zip.
I stand and move against
The things that oppose you.
I dance and twirl and hurl mighty stones
Into the sea of love and grace
For you.
I pace the shoal til my high hopes for you
Come low enough for me to take down,
And then I wrestle them to the ground
And have them fully,
For you.....
And for me.

-jenn

There's a heart of sand
On an asphalt road
In a subdivision in Oklahoma City.
It just appeared
Like the stigmata
On the palms of a saint.
It's here to say that right in the middle
Of all this hate
And hairsplitting and division in this country,
Love still reigns.
And will if anyone will take the time to tip our hats,
Or remove them,
Or bow our knees,
Not as a show of what we believe
Or don't believe,
But as strength of will,
To prove what we would do
To woo true love,
And brotherhood and sisterhood
Back into our everyday lives.

-jenn

It's not the brightest light in the heavens
But it's always there
A known associate of the big dipper
Line it up
And then you can align yourself to the North Star.
Would you aid and abet Polaris?
If it decided to run?

Get a feel for how it looks,
And feel yourself facing north.
Right face from here is east,
Left face, west.
About face will turn you directly south
Down towards Mexico.
You can decide which way you need to go
When you decide to run.

But remember this, my fugitive star,
When you gaze into the sky at night,
You are a part of every constellation
No matter where you go.
The universe has a way of knowing,
And you can never really hide from anyone or anything,
Except yourself.

So maybe tonight, I'll just align myself with northern true,
And then I'll stay right here with you,
And be true to myself alone.
And when I'm done,
Maybe I can be true to you,
If it matters.

-jenn

Do you think cotton grows on trees
Like money? Asked the farmer
To a man whose sack had ripped
And cotton fell and flew off in the wind.

And the man stooped to gather the few bolls he could catch,
And patched his sack with a bit or burlap twine.
The cold wind blew right through his soul,
And his fingers blistered,
But in his heart he sang a cotton pickin' song.

"The best things in life are the hidden things
That nobody dares to share,
Love between a certain pair of turtledoves,
Words the ear will never hear,
Songs that never get sung out loud
In the light of day.

The best lives are the hidden lives
The secret smiles
That no one else can see.
Only a few knowing souls can guess
The happiness of silent eyes,
The dress in the closet that never gets worn,
The love that blooms amidst the thorns
So quietly and so profuse,
And the most beautiful cotton
That never gets picked,
And money that never gets paid."

"Naw, you don't know what I'm talking about,"
I heard the old man sing.
"A mystery, a secret place, a very beautiful thing,
A hidden life, where love grows stronger,
Every single day."

-jenn

"Now explain to me just one more time," she said,
"About the Mexican polka."
He began to tell, and fidgeted with his drink.
It gave her time to think of another question to ask him.
She smiled and played with the end of a wisp of her hair,
And as he wound down with his lengthy explanation,
She was ready for him
With another great question
For him to answer.

He didn't know that she was a dancer.
Her legs were growing tired,
But maybe his tenure at the University would provide
Her some security,
And so she danced with him tonight,
Not only in her heels,
But in her great conversation skills,
And he was never sorry twice.

-jenn

Texas snow.
Take those pictures while you can!
Cactus flowers frozen,
A patch of sand, just beyond,
Already showing through.
By noon it will be 45°
And every snowflake,
No matter how unique,
Has a common melting point of 32.1.
So seize them in still-life while you may,
And while you're at it,
Seize the day, too, why don't ya?

-jenn

Cats pretend.
A candy wrapper found,
A crackly sound,
The paper's come to life.
The little gray one catches it,
Runs away with it in her mouth.
It is almost a mouse,
But it is fully a little gift
To lay at the feet of her boy.

Some humans can only see
The concrete dry.
Others find an opportune moment
To sculpt their children's hands
And write a date.
Abstract pretensions
Show our close evolutionary connection
With house cats,
At least with those of us
That can pretend.
-jenn

A fire breaks out in a creek bed
In Dallas,Texas.
A green- eyed Mexican National
Burned alive.
He wouldn't give his PIN number
To some thugs that wanted to rob him.
He didn't even have any money in that account.
He'd been in an argument with his boss that day
Who said he wasn't going to pay him,
And, as an illegal, there was nothing he could do about it.

They say crime doesn't pay.
Being a marginalized person doesn't, either.

-jenn

Fresh peaches are for sunny days
When heat sweats all your time away,
And the juicy nectar fills your soul.
It rolls unbidden down your chin,
Embarrasses you as you drool
And wipe your grin away,
And you can't help yourself.

Peach jam is for a winter morn
Before the anxieties are born for the day.
The sugar added to the pulp
Feeds your brain a much needed shot
Of glucose,
So you can remember,
The earth still turns,
The revolution around the burning sun
Is still going on,
Even in December,
And soon, the sunny days will return,
And fresh peaches,
And you can't help yourself.

-jenn

I heard an ad on the radio,
"Do youuuuu want a new job?"
My mind raced during the pregnant pause,
Maybe I could change my profession?
"You could work for DoIt Construction!"
Oh hell no! I'm good!
Maybe this ad was paid for by
The Employers Who Want You Not To Change Jobs,
Reminding you, you could have to work for a living.

-jenn

A powerful secret:
When men sing love songs,
They will turn around
And sing them to somebody new,
If it doesn't work out with you.

But when a woman writes lyrics of love,
She will sing them to you,
And you alone,

Because women know
When a love song has been written for them,
And when it hasn't.

Men don't.
So women could sing
The same dern thing
Over and over and men wouldn't care.
They're just picturing the women
In their underwear, anyway.

But women don't have the power or desire
To see through men's outer, or under, attire.
They see through lyrics instead,
And read between the lines.

So you men would do well to take some time
And write something new
For your new true love,
If you want to keep her stringing along,
For she, like the Lord, prefers a new song
Sung, if any at all.

-jenn

Forty blackbirds line a wire
Facing the police headquarters.
They watch the black suspect walk inside in cuffs.
He tells the black detective that he's never seen the black man in the photo,
The black vic who got capped.
He denies shooting the vic in his car.
He denies being on the scene.
But there is video evidence,
And so the officers take him
Still in cuffs, back to the black and white car
And put him in the back seat,
And just as the door clicks solidly shut,
The blackbirds fly away.

And on the other side of town,
The same exact thing is happening,
Except with a white detective, a white perpetrator, and a white victim.
But the birds in the wire are not white, but gray.

Separate, and almost equal.

-jenn

There were signs in the heavens that night,
Seven stars for Krishna,
Seven for Christ,
Eight for the tomb of the unknown soldiers who fell.

One star fell, too, in their honor,
Leaving the number at 21,
A gun salute,
And a baby star questions,
"Are they going to shoot us now, too?"

-jenn

If you have the money to build a ship,
You could be a pirate,
And furnish it with professional thieves.
They could steal for you,
In your name, and fill your coffers
With baubles of blame, and trophies of shame,
And booty,
Lots of booty.

But if you don't already have the means
To build a ship, the next best way
To christen yourself as a pirate
Is to steal one yourself
And take to the seas,
And rescue a few lost sailors
Who will feel
Indebted to you.
Make them steal
For you.

And of course there are others ways.
These are just two,
If you want to
Be a pirate
And you want to have a crew,
And booty,
Lots of booty.

-jenn

I'm afraid to try your pants on.
I'm afraid they just might fit.
They say if the shoe fits, wear it,
And is tempting as it is
To wear the pants in any situation,
I might find I have to admit
That I'm as big a fat ass as
I've always thought you were.

I know you'd walk a mile in my moccasins
If you only could.
But I find I am unwilling
To wear your pants.

-jenn

In case you notice a more sanitary rot
In your private dump site,
Please be advised,
I've started using something
To make my rot
Cleaner and brighter,
Aromatic and whiter.
Lord knows what's in it,
But it's working as far as I can tell.

-jenn

Don't watch me wrestle both cans at once
Back up from the curb on garbage day.
You'll see me yelling in the wind,
Barking my orders like a marine
And dragging my wayward boys home
By their ears and calling them
Sons of motherless goats.

I'm sure proper ladies drag
One can up at a time
In perfect submission and silence.
Or maybe they have some decent neighbor man
To make an honest woman of them
And deal with the trashcans on their behalf.

But some of us gals don't take well to charity,
And at least a few of us have better things to do.
And me, I use it as a chance
To face the bitter realities
Of garbage, and my true place in the world,
And the total sum of the foul situation bids me curse it!

-jenn

Row your boat gently
Into the night.
Row it gently
Down the stream.
Whatever may be,
Will be alright,
No matter how bad it seems.

Row your boat gently
Into the day,
The new day waiting
Around the bend.
The dream may change
And seem bad, or good,
But it will never end.

Row your boat gently,
Gently, gently,
Merrily, merrrily,
Down the stream.
And take time to not row.
Float a bit,
And try to enjoy the dream.

-jenn

I don't have to travel to China
To encounter philosophy
Foreign to my own,
I can talk 80's music with my  teenage son.

I don't have to travel to remote areas of the globe
To sample some exotic unrecognizable food,
I can burn things beyond recognition
Right here, in my own kitchen.

And I don't have to travel the land or sea
To make one convert, or to divert my attention away from you.
I can know you inside out
From right here,
For I can dream.

-jenn

Once you
Open the pickle jar,
You've either got to eat
Alllllllllll those pickles,
Or you've got to put the lid back on,
And the pickles in the fridge.

But once you
Open me,
You got a fresh can
On your hands,
And there ain't no
Puttin' me up.

-jenn

On the first day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
A long line in th'express lane

On the second day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.

On the third day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Three Cornish hens, Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.

On the fourth day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Four organic punkins, Three Cornish hens, Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.

On the fifth day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Five Wholesome Things!
Four organic punkins, Three Cornish hens, Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.

On the sixth day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Six gluten free muffins
Five Wholesome Things!
Four organic punkins, Three Cornish hens, Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.


On the seventh day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Seven probiotics, Six gluten free muffins
Five Wholesome Things!
Four organic punkins, Three Cornish hens, Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.


On the eighth day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Eight SeaSalt Crackers, Seven probiotics, Six gluten free muffins
Five Wholesome Things!
Four organic punkins, Three Cornish hens, Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.


On the ninth day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Nine soy free chocklits, Eight SeaSalt Crackers, Seven probiotics, Six gluten free muffins
Five Wholesome Things!
Four organic punkins, Three Cornish hens, Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.

On the tenth day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Ten Essential Oils, Nine soy free chocklits, Eight SeaSalt Crackers, Seven probiotics, Six gluten free muffins
Five Wholesome Things!
Four organic punkins, Three Cornish hens, Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.

On the eleventh day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Eleven rice milk puddings, Ten Essential Oils, Nine soy free chocklits, Eight SeaSalt Crackers, Seven probiotics, Six gluten free muffins
Five Wholesome Things!
Four organic punkins, Three Cornish hens, Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.

On the twelth day of Christmas, Sprout's gave to me
Twelve free range drumsticks, Eleven rice milk puddings, Ten Essential Oils, Nine soy free chocklits, Eight SeaSalt Crackers, Seven probiotics, Six gluten free muffins
Five Wholesome Things!
Four organic punkins, Three Cornish hens, Two checkers checking, and a long line in th'express lane.

-jenn

I named my cat after you,
And you can't stop me.
You don't know how many times a day
I call your name.
Sometimes sweetly, so demurely,
Sometimes with a shade of chagrin,
"Hello there Trouble," I roll my eyes,
And scratch his little chinny chin chin.

-jenn

I am unlearned,
Brusque and brout.
I wear my pannies inside out
For all the world to see--
A silent rebellion
To all hypocrisy.
I'm not fit
For human consumption,
But, please,
Take me into your program,
Whittle me down to size,
Into something you consider useful,
So I can be used,
But you may find,
I whittle too,
And you may be changed.
You may be more you
When I'm through.
Maybe you'll grin
When you see my pannies right side in,
But maybe your smile will turn to a pout
When you look down at your own drawers,
So inside out.

-jenn

In this strange society, a conveyor belt brings
A never-ending supply of things you don't need.
It dumps them into your life.

You never have time to miss anything.
Something newer and more improved
Is right there to fill your every need
And promises to move you
Into a higher plane of a more satisfying existence.

I have sat for days, trying to go through
All this junk the assembly line dumped
Just inside my front door.
I don't want any of it any more,
And I don't want to spend one more second
Of my time, or an erg of my energy
Processing it all.

I'm turning tail on this strange society,
Walking straight down the hall
And right out the back door.
I don't need it.
I don't want it.
Leave me alone.

-jenn

This sprawling rose was never pruned.
Some of its branches, heavy on the ground
With winter blooms, drape as a marvel,
A wonder to the eye, while other boughs
Diverge unto the sky in resplendent praise
Of love and life and invincible majesty.

She laughs at her haters and those who warned
Of doom if she wasn't properly tamed
And pruned, for she has grown
Into a valiant tree,
Yes, truly a marvel, a wonder, a sign,
A thing of beauty, an inspiration for any open mind.

-jenn

This time of year, the days are all downhill
And run together.
My soul is lightly tethered to the wind.
My mind begins to blow.
I'm amazed at various scenes,
And though I know
I've been here all along,
Like the leaves, I've fallen,
Scattered my memories about like ashes,
Seen flashes of truth from the future and the past,
And visions of things that might have been
Or still could be,
If I would only ask.

-jenn

Progenitors these days pave the way
For us to learn all about our DNA
And all that it prescribes.
We sit alone in the doctor's chair,
Filling out the questionnaire.
We can say thanks
In all those places where it says
"Have you or anyone in your family ever had 'fill-in the blank.'"
We can also feel their doom,
Write our names up on their tombs with them,
For they feel the very same way,
If only their pride would let them say it.
If only ours would let us.
But the generation gap has closed,
And our children will be the ones
To let us know,
And that will get us
Right in the dignity.

-jenn

We are genetically modifying ourselves.
Soon we will be barren and seedless,
Bigger, but not juicier,
More colorful, albeit, more plastic-ier looking,
Not good for anything but breathing up a lot more air.
And who, or what, will benefit from that?
Only the trees, whose plot this all may be anyway.

-jenn

Sometimes truth doesn't set you free,
It just makes you old,
And in your ancient wisdom
You sit, with a cold reality,
A realization of yourself
As you truly are.

But in your humble brokenness,
A better reality breaks
Over your head, like an egg,
Into your mind, like morning's sweet day.
And in that beautiful, quiet moment,
A pearl is cast to you,
For you are no longer a swine,
Your heart's desire is known,
You've come fully around,
And then you see,
The Truth really has
Set you free after all.

-jenn

I have seen a warrior's face.
Warriors who go out for raids
And don't come back,
Or come back scathed
By what they've seen,
By what they've had to do.

And we had medicine for that,
The smoke, the stomp, the take-to-water for days
Until the heart was cleansed.
We had medicine for fear and shame,
Medicine to give you back your heart,
And help you live again.

But after that war,
Medicine stopped.
Rounded up, and no more talk
Of the Great Spirit, the principal people,
Our warriors were crippled
Unceremoniously,
And so were we.
And now, you call it PTSD,
But then, it was living catastrophe,
And it lasts
Many generations
Without the Right Medicine.

-jenn

A little gray cat sat for two hours straight
And watched the faucet drip.
It tilted its head and continued to sit and stare.
Where do all those tiny drops of water come from?
Where do all those tiny droplets go?
A strange mystery.
But the cat is smart enough to know
That when it eventually wants a drink,
Curiosity will give way,
And trust will emerge
Right there in the sink.
It will quench its thirst
By means of this enigmatic machine
That it doesn't understand.

-jenn

I gaze into a magic mirror
That magnifies the epithelials,
Every cell that makes my face,
And I can trace every line,
And every place where wrinkles will soon be.

I look at me,
And think
That every step
Along my way
I've changed.

I grew uncontrollably,
And never could adjust how tall or short I was,
How many hairs I had upon my head,
But I always recognized myself
And reckoned this state as
Better off than dead.

But someday maybe I will look
Into this mirror and see
An unrecognizable me,

And what then?

-jenn

Night comes.
Shadows take strange shapes.
Peace seems very far away,
And so does morning.
Winter nights,
So stark and long,
A bit too tranquil
And ever warning:
Something tragic this way comes.
But I learned a practical sensibility
From my son:
I sleep better with a security blanket, too.

-jenn

Dreamers dream, and lovers love,
And lovers love to dream.
Dreamers love to love themselves to sleep,
So that they might dream deep and in color,
And even in the trancelike states
Of their subconscious minds,
They can smell the jasmine.

I can smell gingerbread tonight,
And aromatic coffee on to brew,
And in my dream, so many things I ought to do,
But I hear music on the portico.
Ting-a ling, ting-a-ting tong.

I want nothing more than to dance with you
While the night is young,
And my dreams are playing a song
Just for us on the wind chimes.

-jenn

When someone holds your hand,
And let's you hold on
Until you're ready to let go,
That is the unperverted spirit
Of female originator,
That is a love that nourishes you
And lets you be your best.

When someone runs beside you,
Holding you up while you learn
To ride a bicycle,
That is the unperverted spirit
Of the masculine ancestor.
That is a love
And a pride in you
That you can never, and should not ever
Have in yourself.

And when someone comes to you
In your fear and your weakness
And becomes your refuge and your strength
This is the unpervertable principal source
And sustainer of your soul.

We need someone to hold our hands,
To love and nourish all our lives,
An alma mater.

We need someone to be proud of us,
A pater magnus.

We need a secret place
To live and move and be,
And we have one,
And you will never be denied
Again.

-jenn

You've wiped your feet so many times on me,
And not from meanness,
But from disregard.
You mistook me for a welcome mat,
Although my distinguishing characteristics
Clearly marked me as a coverlet.

You could have pulled me up
And over your head,
And dreamed beneath the eyelets of my lace,
Buried your face in me
In laughter and in tears,
Instead of wiping mud on me
For all those years.

But I've been stuck just outside the door,
The backdoor here out in the elements,
Only washed when rain comes down, and wind
Sweeps across my back to brush me off.
But maybe limbo is a better place,
A far better place to which I've come.
Safer here outside the threshold,
Than in the deep recesses of your mind.

- jenn

The sky is shy today.
It stays on the fringes close to the wall.
It walks the halls
When no one else does.
It asks to be excused, hit or miss,
Odd intermittent times the bathroom
Goes unused, so it can be alone.

The realization of her gender
Has come upon her suddenly, here at middle school.
She questions her identity and her fate.
She can't relate to any final destination,
And yet she can't relegate anymore
The spasmodic methodologies,
The onset of menses,
And months begin.

She hears ancient doxologies ring
But makes no apologies
For not singing,
For not even uttering
A single word,
As she wonders if anyone else
Has ever heard "the talk"
Exactly this way.

-jenn

Once you prove how right you are
To everyone else,
Once you've finally shown all the other people
How perfect, how smart you've lived,
I wonder if you will then consider
Proving it to yourself,
And proving it to your children
With a heart of unfeigned love?

-jenn

I'm puttin on airs!
I like to wear such light and fluffy
Feathery wares.
They're bright,
Like the flight of Quetzalcoatl
At night,
With a million stars blinking
And winking and nodding
Yes! Yes! Yes!

So come if you will,
As you are for the stars approve!
But live and let live!
And remove your critical eyes,
If need be.
Pluck them out!
For tis better for all
To enter here mauled
And maimed
Than with a bitter, resentful,
Self righteous, two-eyed,
Spiritual pride,
And ruin the sense of harmony here,
Where the clear unobstructed
Divine Childlike Mind
Offers an open channel
Of divine energy.

-jenn

At the mile marker on my walk,
A leaf-nado joined me,
A whirlwind of fallen leaves.

Gently cycling up, with a tail trailing back behind,
A fall bride, not too feminine,
But gallantly she strode
A half a block to the altar,
But there, she fell apart.

The train of her gown fell on the street.
The brightly colored leaves
That had adorned her bodice like sequins
Lay there lifelessly.
As her towering torso caved,
She, halting, dropped my hand,
And whispered with her ultimate breath,
"Stay young while you still can."

-jenn

We want a rose without its thorn
But not without its bloom.
We want a witch without her spells
But not without her broom.
We want to cherry pick our lives
And have someone attend,
Make things easy for us in front,
And clean up our mess behind.

But true roses grow on thorny brush,
And true love grows amidst real life,
With tears and laughter and ease
And strife,
But when you quiet yourself, you'll see,
The still small voice of love
Growing there with you
In the wilderness.

-jenn

They accused me of being full of my own shit,
And I asked them whose shit I should be full of
If not my own?
I don't understand this world,
And it doesn't understand me.

So my telephone doesn't ring.
My notifications don't notiffficate.
My elevator doesn't go all the way to the top.

My fog horn blows.
My fog bells ring.
But the damn fog comes anyway!
I don't understand this world,
And it doesn't understand me.

-jenn

I was chided one day for saying "balls."
Maybe I said the word too loud?
Maybe I should have said "testicles," "cajones," or "flingle-dingles?"
(Well ok, probably not flingle-dingles.)

Maybe I shouldn't have been in a church that was posing as a coffee shop?
Maybe, in attempts to reach the "unchurched," or the "dechurched,"
People shouldn't chide people about the words they choose to speak.

But probably, I shouldn't have been in a church that was posing as a coffee shop.

-jenn

I remember once our family pet,
A Standard Collie, went into heat
And only found for herself
A little chihuahua she could breed.
(Now this isn't a statement about
Arranged marriages.
However, this may be part of the popularity
And demand for things like E-Harmony
And farmers only dot com,
Although their success rate remains to be seen.)

But this recollection serves today
To simply say that we children laughed
At how our big dog found a way to let him.
How she hunkered, poised just so,
Down on the ground, to get low enough
For him to get her,
And how we cackled, how we guffawed,
At his earnest and comical attempts
At humping her.

Then he succeeded and got it on,
And they went on and on and on
Til it was over,
And then our laughter changed to fear.
Our parents could now hear our plaintive cries
Inside where they sat, presumably
Reading the paper and watching tv.
Terrified, we cried out,
"He's stuck to her! They're stuck together!"

But our parents never even came to see.
We stared awkwardly,
And were afraid to move in too close to interfere.
Their personal space cut a large swath across our yard,
And finally we moved away from them
And went to play somewhere else out back
Where we couldn't see them anymore.

But it was a sight I would never forget,
Natures way of not allowing
The male to mate and run.
Human males have evolved to stay for a little cuddle
And some pained, howling conversation.

And it also makes me think that
We, as humans, should be careful who's around
When we go into heat.
You never know who you might get stuck with.

-jenn

Someday historians will look back at our time
And say that World War 3 began in 1999,
Followed closely by World War 4,
And they will tell how some were brave
Just by going to the store
Where they lost their lives.
Some went off to battle at work,
Some attacked, sleeping, in their beds,
Some, shot in the head at country music fests.

And we can pray that they run out of bullets, I guess,
Or we could quit printing the money used to buy them,
But what's true rings always true,
The poor and the war we will always have with us.

-jenn

I was acetically acidifying my red lentils
When a late night guzzler tottered in.
He glared at me and my plate
And said, "I hate ta tell ya this,
But them frijoles don't look right."
He argued with me for a spell
Although I never said a word.
Finally I did say, "Have you been drinking gin?"
"Whiskey!" He yelled and then went on
To call me 40 names for a tea-totaller!
(Although he left out my preferred one--ascetic!)

"You don't know your liquor," he muttered.
"And you know what THAT means."
"No, I don't," I said, "And I don't care.
But you don't know beans
From lentils,
Although that probably doesn't matter either."

-jenn

When unseen forces mold your shape from home,
It will not matter where you roam.
The force from within that creates that look upon your face
Will also create an equal and opposite force against you every place you go.
Maybe it's true we find that which we seek.
Maybe it's also true,
That which we run from
Will find us over and over again.

Until we stop,
And stand up for ourselves,
Understand the past,
Then hand it back,
We run in circles,
And we let our tails chase us.

But we can understand the force within.
We can change the look upon our face.
We can love.
We can forgive.
And we can live in peace
And roam
Happily ever after.
( it just ain't easy. )

-jenn

At least when I walked the Tysfjord,
My struggle was up,
And awkwardly I won.
The water I drank was clean.
It had a fallen from the sky
Through fire and ice.
It was purified and perfected.
It fell in big white drifts of snow
And melted in the spring
And met me at my thirst.

And now on my way down,
The water is muddied from me clowning around upstream.
My battle is to descend,
And graciously I lose,
And like the sodden waters I caused,
I meet me at my worst.

-jenn

Tonight, as stars draw nigh
And peer into the milky sky
To see if anything is new under the sun,
I pray that you will be in view for them.
And I pray, too, that you will dare
To steal fire again from the heavens,
Great Prometheus.

I will drive the get away
So that you, or rather, we,
Will not be caught.
For this world needs fresh fire,
But no one wants to be tied forever
To a stone where, eternally,
Eagles eat one's liver.

So this time we humans promise
That you will have aiders and abettors
And accomplices.

-jenn

When she died, she was surprised
As she looked down from a window in heaven,
That her husband didn't go to bed at eleven anymore.
Now he retired more early,
Seven-thirty or eight.
But of course his new honey
Didn't like to stay up so late.
Good thing when a window closes in heaven,
The good lord remembers not to shut the door
All the way.

-jenn

If it seems to you
That I wander through the day
Aimless and forlorn,
An unattended winterbourne
That comes and goes away,
A lazy row of unthinned corn,
A little boy blue with unshorn sheep
And daisies in the hay,
And little bits of sticks strewn in
Amongst the peat moss mix,
I say I'm doing pretty good
To keep water in a bowl
For wild game and fowl to come and drink,
For, I'm only six,
And wild birds seem very important to me.

-jenn

Once a sleeping boy awoke
And spoke about a cat who'd come
And curled up to take a nap beside his head.
And that, my love, is the breadth and brevity of life,
One statement, one half-awake epiphany
To divulge surprised in a sleep talking slur.
And then, right back to bed,
To heavy dreams and heavy breathing,
And leave the heavy lifting to the morn
Of another lifetime and another day.

-jenn

All my gears have been worn thin.
Now, all I do is turn,
But I don't click with anyone.
Nothing catches, nothing goes.
Even my spin has started to slow down.
I'm finally getting a look at what's going on.

Is this all I've been doing my whole life?
Just adding my two cents
To the daily strife and strain?
Ah.
Well.

I hope when some great someone sees
How unproductive I am now,
I'll be taken out of this weird machine
And thrown out,
And like all the rest of the garbage,
Maybe I'll wind up in the ocean.

And maybe, as I lie and rust
Some magic silt will nestle amidst
What used to be my teeth,
And I'll grow back with starfish arms and ossicles,
And be a part of a new hydraulic system,
Instead of a new world order.

-jenn

They've asked me to play Cynthia Rothrock
In the upcoming Hollywood blockbuster,
The Life and Times of Cynthia Rothrock,
The great female Kung Fu mistress of the silver screen
From the eighties,
(The 1980's that is.)

Because although Cynthia could play herself
She doesn't look like an older version of herself
Like I do,
Or at least like what her fans think she would look like.
She dies her hair brown now,
And has lost about twenty pounds.
Oh, and she's not willing to sleep with Harvey Weinstein,
Oh
(And he can't make her.)

-jenn

He limped into the Indian clinic
And then he limped back out.
He was there for his regularly scheduled dental cleaning,
And nobody asked him about that open sore on the back of his leg.
Wounded knees are hereditary around here.

But when they called him to remind him to come back in
Six months from now,
He had already gone septic and given up the ghost,
Like Jesus did,
Even before anyone could poke him with a spear.

But they just said, "Well,
That's one less NDN
To keep on the books here
For the feds to take care of."

-jenn

In a society addicted to flexion,
It's good to remember to stretch sometime.
In the midst of stooping and hunching, bowing and scraping,
Say to your self "Blessed are the upright!"
Then stand up straight.

Our cement is setting.
Our faces are freezing this way,
In sad, starved frowns and pained expressions.
We 're drawing up taut,
In fetal positions all across humanity
And it should not be so.

Let everyone else try to survive ,
But you, rise over all this
Socially accepted, politically corrected bereavement.
Rise up, out of the ashes of all these wars and hates and divisions and delusions
And LIVE, and smile, and lie out flat on the ground,
And stretch your bones up and out in honor of the Invincible Sun,
And be very happy !

-jenn

Just south of my sternum,
Instead of a belly,
You'll find a gyroscope.
It spins at speeds that create
Magnetic fields.
The schematic that runs my programs
Is more complex than the hadron collider.
Only tai chi can harness the power it yields.

I start tsunamis,
And I end them.
I churn the vastest sea.
I wiggle one toe,
And mythical kittens appear
To pounce on me.

Stratospheres ascend, descend,
And this Skyborg is gradually growing skin.
Maybe someday my artificial intelligence
Will come to life,
Or at least collide with a copacetic particle
Out there somewhere.

-jenn

My sneezing fit scared my cat.
He pouted all day long,
Avoided me, and gave me the silent treatment.

I wondered if an apology would make any difference to him.
I knew apologizing would affect me
For the worse.
So I didn't.

He quit sulking at suppertime.

I wonder what it will take
For others to forgive me
For the biological fits I've thrown,
Much less the unreasonable ones.

-jenn

Is it better to question
And find an answer
Than to have nagging doubts
That you refuse to see,
Chase you, paint you into invisible corners?

Is it better to try and fail
Or succeed
Than to let regret erode your soul.

(It is.
But why listen to me?
I truly was born yesterday.)

:P

-jenn

I brought my neighbor a leaf that had fallen
Off my tree and taped it to his door.
He didn't like it. He didn't thank me,
For he is in a war, like Don Quixote,
And leaves are his windmill.

Everyday, he's raking, raking,
Bagging, bagging,
Wiping his brow.
But everyday the wind is blowing,
His eyes glaze over. He cuts them around.
All his neighbors' leaves are falling down
And blowing right into his yard.

I think he should move to Piedmont,
Amarillo, or Santa Fe,
If he doesn't like the oak leaves
Falling in his yard this way,
This conspiracy of beautiful burnt orange oak leaves.

Today I saw an industrial strength
Leaf blower strapped to his back
Like an exoskeleton,
Safety goggles bulged like big bug eyes on his face,
And all day long I heard the monotonous hum
Of his good riddance song.

But tonight, the wind is blowing,
Galing, gusting, blustering about,
Knocking more leaves out of the trees
Right down in poor old Joe's yard.
And tonight I found this lovely crimson one,
And tip-toed right up to his door,
And taped it there, for him to find
In the morning.

Hehee

-jenn

Events create a recurring energy
That gives snowflakes their precise uniqueness.
Even the feelings and desires behind the actions
Will inform significant patterns in iron shavings,
Tea leaves, and life lines on your palm.

Or

Is it truly that the tea leaves,
The swirls and lines upon your palms,
Birch smoke rising, and laurel leaves
Predestinate upcoming events
By the words of a living plan?

-jenn

Recollect with me
The Ancient Peace,
And by doing so,
A Future Peace will be garnered,
Because every action
Not only has
An equal and opposite reaction,
But also a quantum entanglement
In a here-to non-local realm.

And so where any two or three agree in peace,
Prison doors may open for a Gandhi
Or a Nelson Mandela, or even a Phyllis Diller, somewhere,
And just maybe they will come for us,
And in turn, set us free.

-jenn

Facebook suggested I poke you,
And I started to,
But I remembered that meme you posted
About, "My face when somebody pokes me
At 3:27 am."

There was a beautiful chain letter
One of my friends had sent me.
All you had to do was say AMEN or type it, maybe,
And then forward the letter to all your contacts,

Which I never do,
But I wanted to send it you,
Because I want you to have all the good luck in the world
And none of the bad,
And I think they only said
Your socks wouldn't match
If you didn't forward it within 13 minutes!
And that's a small price to wager
In the face of all the good they promised.

But then I remembered that meme,
And that face!

So....
I'm not gonna poke you
Until maybe 8 am?
And.... I've still got 7 minutes to think
About sending that chain letter
Before something weird happens in my sock drawer!

So..... Don't you worry bout a thang, Baby!

-jenn

I wish you could hear this cat purr.
I wish you could feel it
Like the transcendent quantum waves of love it is.
My mind goes blank within it.
My thoughtlessness rides the undulations
To some great phantasmic akashic record,
A majestic zero point in the cat's cosmogony.

And as the vibes of instinct shake me
Loose into a sea of forgiveness,
I find I trust my beginnings and my endings all
To a tale of a cat and a mouse,
To a song that is never finished
And eternal lyrics that finish themselves
Then change and start again
In a beautiful complex loop.

And now, I trust my universe
May be just as beautifully unimportant
As the ones created and beheld
By the om of this cat's purr.

-jenn

Suddenly I felt a great transference,
Like I was the rational one,
Like I had all the power,
Like I was the river the car had driven off into.

I was filling the car with water.
I was pushing it down into the silt
From which it would never return.

I didn't know why I was doing that.
Was it my fault?
I didn't understand
That this is what deep rivers do
When some fool goes and drives his car off into them.

Water is ever true to its own mysterious nature,
Its cohesive polarity.
Water sinks, and it sinks anything else
That might take it on or allow the deep
To penetrate its buoyancy.

-jenn

My Lancelot, my Lancelot,
I'll change your name when we leave Camelot.
We'll disappear into a sylvan dream.
The castle, with its high-walled gates,
Its ramparts, its fancy plates and designated places to sit
In the mead hall will be no more
Than the memory of some rotted thing drudged up from the stinking moat.

And if we live in a cave or a hut,
We will call it Halcyon,
And kindle the hearth of Love and Peace
In the quiet home of favored bliss
Within the orb of our tangled arms embrace.

But what shall I change your great name to?
Is there something more lofty than Monta-goo?
Or even Lancelot?
And what is in a name, anyway?
What word could dare speak of the worlds I see in your face?

-jenn

A big she-bear sleeps in a den she dug
Under a sycamore deep in the smoky mountains,
And I am just one of the cubs she bore
While she slept in a state of hibernation.

My brother and sister cub and I
Sense the rich colostrum
Up high on our mother bear,
And even with our eyes still unopen we know
That we need this. We struggle to go to where it is.
Our great mother succors our every need,
Even as she sleeps.

Mother Bear dreams, and we do, too.
We smile alive and full and know
That as we dream and wake and nurse,
Our mama bear sleeps, yet cares for us
Well into springtime, when everything will change.
Yet, mama bear's care will be fiercely the same
When she wakes.

-jenn

Every time I think Ive found myself,
I find someone who's more me than me,
The me I want to be.

Makes me want to change again,
Readjust my course,
(Tho somewhere deep, I know it's only ashes to ashes or dust to dust,
And what course I take to get there matters not.)

I'm starting to feel that all this talk of diversity is a lie.
We are all more alike than we think,
Maybe more than we'd like.

But maybe, if the pursuit of individuality
Has overshadowed the pursuit of happiness,
Then we torture our own souls
Trying so hard to be different,
Trying to be something we're not.

-jenn

An olive branch gets shaken down.
Olives fall upon the tarps
That have been laid out on the ground.
The olives get the squeeze,
And virgin oil of the highest purity flows.

And I am falling unprepared,
But I feel free, and I'm not scared.
I hear the branch and it's clattering leaves
Call out to me,
"O live! O live! O live!
Live and write your poetry!"

-jenn

Every time I think I found myself
I find someone who's more me than me
The me I want to be

Makes me want to change
Readjust my course
( There somewhere deep I know it's only ashes to ashes or dust to dust
And what course I take to get there matters not)

I'm starting to feel that all this talk of diversity is a lie
We are all more alike than we think
Maybe more alike than we would like to be
And maybe if the pursuit of individuality
Has overshadowed the pursuit of happiness
Then we torture our own souls
Trying so hard to be different

-jenn

A song I don't like is on the radio.
I want to turn it down but I'm talking on the phone.
I hang up and start to turn the dial,
But I hear the first few sounds
Of a long lost chart-topping favorite,
And now the volume isn't up enough,
So I crank the music high.
One-sidedness is everything,
And everything is relative.

-jenn

I am a warhorse marching down to war.
(I fight a battle for my own spirit.)
I hold my head up, unafraid and proud.
(Fear and shame have no place on the battleground.)

I fight a good fight. My mighty chest
Expands full of crisp air, my lungs, my breath
Intuit the freedom, the change of direction
My heart can take, after I've won.
There will be peace beyond the horizon.
Green pastures await my soul
Just through the other side
Of the triumphant arching gate.
Victory shall be mine.

-jenn

I'm a horse with a blanket coat
Wrapped across my back,
Strapped easily around my speckled belly.
I feel the double love.
The sun the universe sent to me
Shines above my head.
The blanket that the human brought has stopped the wind,
And I am warm again.

The human will bring alfalfa hay,
And I have dry Bermuda grass beneath my feet,
And in a while, the human's child
Will bring me carrots and a sugar cube
And scratch the star of white that blazes out
Between my eyes and up
Under the shock of my black mane
That hangs down between my ears.
He will rub his nose to mine
And breath deep the smell of my sweat
Mixed with my chestnut hair.
And time and life will come and go,
And that child will grow into
Who knows what,
But one thing is sure,
He will always love horses.

-jenn

I've found my river.
I go easily in its flow.
It's got the same speed as me,
Though it pushes me some,
And sometimes it slows me,
But it is home,
And yet, it runs away with me,
Down to our common destination,
The everlasting beauty of an amaranthine sea.

The Aegean strait that waits for me
Leads me from its lowly place,
Draws me from my high.
Open arms at sea level and below
Will and woo me as I go.
The Aegean Great sums up all the rivers' flow.
It would have been my fate
No matter which river I'd have chosen,
But I can glow in this river,
And I will go free and effervesce
With this transcendent river.

-jenn

He tried to carry too many things
To his car in just one trip,
And I fell out of one of the sacks
But he never even knew.
I rolled like a can down the hill
And clonked into the curb.
There, I decided to make a left
And roll a little bit more.
Now I lay, sprawled in a way
That may seem awkward to most,
But I feel fine, and I am lying
On the sunny side of the street.

-jenn

If all the world is cheese whiz
And pork rinds
Then we have at least a 50 percent chance
Of casting our pearls to swine

I'm going to hold on to my pearls
Like an expensive rosary,
And pray to the gods of some other dimension,
And hope that they aren't piggies, too.

-jenn

Orbits are like addictions.
So if you want to capture Mercury
And get it out of the furnacial heat
From its closeness to its star
So that you can study its properties,
You better take its orbit along too.
Put it in the bag to take back to the lab
Where you are comfortable.
Take your time.
You might as well.
But you will see no rhyme or reason
To the many ways that Mercury tends to misbehave
In the comfort of your climate controlled conditions.
Mercury not only can stand the heat
Of the Sun's great kitchen,
But also prefers it.
And while you take the weekend,
Mercury will slip off and put itself and its orbit
Right back where it longs to be,
Where, even its misbehavior is seen as behaving properly.

-jenn

The wildest creature I saw at the zoo
Sported six-inch heels and I could see through her floral mini-dress
That she wasn't wearing panties.

Her husky mate ahead of her
Pushed the stroller,
And when he turned around, I saw
The word "Faith," emblazoned on his black t-shirt
With the "T" in the middle
Looking all two-edged sword.

It may take more than Faith, Hope, and Love,
I thought as I walked by.
It may take more than being in one Accord, too.
This might take a Pink Cadddilack!

-jenn

When I have the urge to skip the night,
Have breakfast and go on with day,
Remind me that even the light can be nocturnal,
And that my journal is incomplete
Without the sweet rest of day---darkness,
Where I put my feet up,
And put my head away for awhile.

Remind me that's it's better,
This ounce of prevention that I take,
That, odds are, I won't die
Before I wake, so it's ok to sleep.
Then I will lay me down,
But I may keep one eye open
Til morning light,
Then run all day,
And still think about skipping the night,
Have breakfast for supper then churn
More butter for later to feel I've earned my keep,
And wonder if ever I could do enough
To prove my worth to you or feel
I've earned a good night's sleep.

-jenn

I have meat, and I have drink
Waiting for me at castle blue.
And I will eat when I get home,
Back to my home at castle blue.

Persephone ate a pomegranate seed.
She was far away from home
In an underworld where she now must stay
All fall and winter, and she can't roam.

So too, I know that I can't eat
This dangerous food in this hasty place.
I will wait to be consumed,
And to consume in a better place--
My castle blue.

And I don't speak in this foreign land,
Except to encourage with psalms and hymns,
Riddles for those with eyes to see
And ears to hear,
And sometimes, I might talk to you,
Can you hear me back there, in castle blue?

-jenn

They sit together even if they do not talk.
They're social like that.
They look into one another's eyes sometimes,
And sometimes, they can't,
And it's not because they've told one another lies,
Or done some shameful thing.
It's just that there's a time and a place
For soul searching,
And a time to look away,
And let everything just be.

-jenn

You can make your own luck.
Drop a penny,
And pick it up yourself.

-jenn

The most interesting thing
I saw at the zoo today
Was a touring group of Mennonites.
A little boy, almost two, toddled to see the chimps.
He wore jeans and a short sleeve shirt of dark plaid,
And blue suspenders, just like his dad's.

Several lovely women wore plain fine dresses
They had made themselves.
They also wore small white hats
Bobby-pinned to lovely locks of long, undyed hair.
None of them wore a stitch of makeup,
And they didn't need to, either.

Children of all ages and older married couples strolled together,
The newlyweds lagged a bit behind. Yes, you can just tell,
In any religion or cultural setting,
For they are still in love.

-jenn

Know thyself,
My loving friend.
You are a complicated
Chemical compound
Whose very equation is complex,
A mixture of brains and brawn,
Heart and soul and spirit,
Love and sex,
So knowing you is sometimes hard for me,
But so beautifully intriguing
And so worthwhile.

But please understand,
Knowing yourself
Is even more difficult
Than possibly we comprehend
At the moment,
Because if knowing you is hard for me
You may not see your lovely forest
For all your lovely trees.

But you are so worth knowing,
My loving friend,
And there is a mighty kingdom
Full of glorious treasure
Within you.

And so my chant
To me, to you,
A mantra
That we will ever be true to ourselves,
And that we will know ourselves,
Know ourselves.

-jenn

You want to get Lady Luck to disrobe?
A nice warm room with a rosy glow would help.
The sweet smell of oranges,
Nightbirds' chirp,
Knit her a cashmere sweater of heartfelt love words,
And drape her shoulders with it,
And she'll unbutton the one she wore in, herself.
And now, wouldn't that be better?

-jenn

1
The sky is a giant 3-D printer.
You can have whatever you want,
If you can look up and see it in the clouds in the sky.
Someone's getting a new rib cage--
Right now as we speak!
Someone---getting a new spinal column,
Included: a new spinal cord and spinal fluid.
Someone just wants a little red wagon.
Here it is!

And here is a very special dragon
That a very special someone has wished for
And now has seen it in the sky!

It's all yours, my child!
Look up,
And behold what you will!

I keep looking for a new heart,
But all I found so far
Are heart shaped leaves on the ground,
But even they remind me, "Look up! Look up!
Don't look down!
Look up to the sky!
It's all yours, my child!
Look up,
And behold what you will."

2
Well today I saw a heart in the sky
Or maybe it was just a dotted "i"
Or a dotted lowercase "j"
Or maybe it was an umbrella
That I borrowed to jump off the barn as a child.
The anxious whoosh of the approaching ground
Broke it spines and turned it forever upside down

It's constant smile eerily derided me
With a continuous, "Good Job!"
For all these years.

I think I'll throw it out today,
And ponder what meaning there might be
In a lowercase "j"

-jenn

You want to be native?
You want to see
The utter futility
Reserved in all things?
In building houses?
In planting crops?
In putting stock in the buffalo?
In moving west
And making room peaceably
For others to come
And build their dreams.
And with their square white picket fences,
Cordon off the simple winding trails
That you and the rabbit followed
To good spring water back in the day?

Their gospel says this world and everything in it
Is reserved for fire,
And maybe, all human beings would do well
To look forward to the humility
And the futility
Of all things.

- jenn

It's not better to give.
It's necessary.
The human condition
Undeniably exists
To perpetuate itself
With the gift of life.

And regardless of your lofty estate
Or lowly,
You will find your heart has burst
If you miserly only take
For all of your years.
Why don't you open your ears
To the music of love
And the generous buzz
Of atoms all around you,
Full and replete,
And share your sweeet heart
With someone who wants you, today?

-jenn

"I used to dream of hunting down grizzly," he said,
"Or maybe black bear, or brown,
But now, I could never bring myself to shoot one."

In my heart I knew
The cherokee story of
How the black bear grew into being
From the cherokee people,
And is considered their close cousin.

The story of how some of their kin grew tired
Of living within the confines of the tribes,
Went out on their own,
And slowly but surely,
Den by den of anti-social men
Grew coarse fur, and grew hearty and stout
And evolved into what we now call bears.

I could see the sad eyes
On this grizzled man,
And I see him moving his clan
Further and further
Out and away from society,
And I have a feeling,
A new kind of bear evolution
Is underway.

-jenn

When I have a special function to attend,
I often leave my pants unzipped.
I'd like to think I did this purposefully.
But, even so, maybe subconsciously,
A statement has been made.

And if such a passive stance of
Displaying my yonic underpants,
Can cause such a fluttering disturbance,
Imagine, if all our bootless worries
Could hurry off to tattle
And leave us alone together
In the shade of this chestnut tree.

-jenn

All dogs go to heaven,
And so do all men.
It's women, so tangled by original sin
Who are accepted, excepted or denied
Based on things....ummm... I'm not quite sure what.

Maybe it's breast size?
Maybe it's how tight her twat is?
Maybe she's born with it.
Maybe it's Maybelline.
But I'm starting to line up more with
Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer
And think that with all the people I know
Who are so sure they're going to heaven,
Maybe I'd prefer to go to hell.

-jenn

What is truth?
It's saved away.
A barn full of peanut hay,
It waits to be hauled out someday
When it is truly needed,
When the wheat's gone by,
The grass is brown and cold and dry,
And cows need to eat something
To nourish themselves
And the babies they're heavy with,
The ones they'll bare
When springin' time is here
And the wheat is green again.

What is truth?
It's locked up tight
In the china cabinet .
When the occasion is good enough,
And we can appreciate it,
It will come out
And shine it's light on our wishes,
And then we 'll know,
But right now, we're too lazy for the truth,
Too lazy to do our dishes,
So we just throw 'em away.

But someday,
We 'll be thankful for peanut hay
And good china,
And Truth.

-jenn

Sometimes I pretend I'm married to roger mckickough.
He wouldn't let his wife wear makeup,
And I don't feel like wearing any today.
And sometimes I feign marriage to brent bartau,
Who never let his wife wear a bra.
That appeals to me some days.
And sometimes I pronounce me
Married to myself
And do whatever the hell I want,
Whenever the hell I want to.

-jenn

Men can discover,
To their surprise, they had
A long lost son, a long lost daughter.
That's how it is when you're a dad,
Sometimes, I suppose.
But a woman dang well knows
When she's become a mother.
And this is just one of the many ways
The sexes differ.

-jenn

I walk with a wild man.
People stare at him.
He wears no shoes.
His hair is long, unkempt at times,
But something about him shines.
Like Merlin, he is magical.
His smile, mischievous, and powerful,
His eyes are alive. He sees all things
Like a child on Christmas Day.
This world is his oyster.
He opens it from within,
Somehow,
And then the day begins to go his way.

And now, I'll go and walk with him,
With my hair combed,
My shoes tied up
Around my feet,
My smile just as mischievous,
Albeit, a by-product
Of his contagious grin.

-jenn

Two little kittens,
One's a male,
He comes up and kinks his tail
And stares directly into my face
And wills me to pet him.
He settles in as I rub his back
And scratch his chin,
And he purrs without remorse,
Loud as a galloping horse
That wins by a mile.

The little girl slinks quietly in
And rubs her body on my shin
And furtively looks around.
She rolls like a ninja on the ground
And up into a ball.
I stroke her soft fur tenderly,
But still, her myow, so plaintive to me,
Seems to be a cry out over second place.

What is it about our estrogen
That makes us less confident
And feel we don't deserve?
That good things are only reserved
For the men?
Maybe because that's how it's been
Since the earth took a swerve
And began revolving around the sun.

-jenn

My cat looks in the mirror and sees
A woman singing lullabies
And playing the guitar.
I look in the mirror and see
A tomcat napping,
Dreaming of scrapping
And finding his amour.

It was almost trained out of me
To the tune of "You're a lover, not a fighter."
But now I see, I'm really quite a bit of both.
And so, I see the cat in me,
And to "quoth the raven,"
Nevermore will I be untrue
To who I really am.

-jenn

Abundance Principle

You know how it is when you open a brand new tube of toothpaste,
And you put a big blob of it on your toothbrush,
Just like the beautiful people on the toothpaste commercials do?

You brush your teeth with a cheesy grin,
Cheating the dentist out of his millions,
And all is well until you get a big dent in the middle of your toothpaste tube.

Because then you see that you're down to half empty.
You dab a mere dot,
Which the hygienists assure us is plenty,
But we feel it's not
Unless it's fluoridated.

But the smile is now wan as you stare at yourself in the mirror,
And you notice your hair needs a doin'
If you're going to keep up with the Joneses.

Then, first thing you know,
You're down, a quart low,
Squeezing the tube with a roller.
Barely enough to dot an I,
And you'll have to scrub hard to cross all your T's
While you gottem.

And we won't talk about bottoms here,
But the same principal is abundantly clear
When it comes to toilet paper.

-jenn

I'm caught in the middle
Somewhere way between
Fall boots and football,
Somewhere between the crowd turning me on,
And the crowd turning on me.

There is a fine line in life
That many say one should not cross,
But I say,
One must bring one's big hand
And one's little hand
All the way up to the stroke of midnight and beyond
When attempting to live the dream,
In order to assess what is real,
And what will turn back into pumpkins and rats.

-jenn

Mother Earth is a big mama possum
With us on her back,
And we ain't gettin' nowhere really
Unless she takes us.
We can fight and jostle as she goes,
Tryin' ta get some better position,
But the only revolution that matters
Is her around the sun.

But when we die,
Some say we fly to where our treasure is.
Mama Possum shakes us free
To go where we want to go.
We may find ourselves on the forest floor,
Or fighting a war we can't win,
Or seeking knowledge in the akashic college of old.
But whatever we do and wherever we go,
Why do I feel like we will know
That our questions of who had it right here on earth
And who had it wrong
Will be like a baby possum asking it's mama
What kind of cheese the moon is made of.

-jenn

All the grizzlies look the same.
The polar bears do, too.
All the giraffes--so similar,
The zebra, the okapi, here at the zoo,
The deer mice, the house mice,
The meerkats, the wallaby, the kangaroo,
The markings, the coats,
Are so like the others of their species.

But look at the stream of human beings
Tramping along the boardwalk
To view the animals,
Hair color, eye color,
Size and shape---
A neon sign of diversity
In the animal kingdom.

Well, us, and the goats.

-jenn

We need Hawks and we need Doves,
Here, in the animal kingdom.
The law of the jungle is the secret way
That keeps us in balance and in health,
In rivulets that we can't see.

But the Great Spirit displays its complex grandeur
Through every one and every thing that lives,
Through the quick glances we might catch of all the individual ones.
We can, if we try, put together,
The cosmic composite,
So that we can fathom the entirety,
Though we might never truly know it.

But this is the animal kingdom.
What of we humans and our complicated societies?
I'm not sure, but I feel it is the same.

And so, My Brother, My Sister, just maybe,
The one you hate,
The one you call 'enemy,'
Is a part and parcel of yourself.

But if you find that too hard to swallow,
Maybe you could at least admit
That your enemy is also somehow a child of the Great Spirit.

-jenn

I've learned to leave when the cool kids leave,
And not to show up
At places they don't go.

Now I'm not cool,
But there's a reason they are,
And we could all learn from that.

-jenn

I remember a church potluck dinner.
I was standing in line
Right behind a woman who had already been through once.
She turned to show me her plate
And pointed to something that hadn't quite satisfied her delicate palate.
"Don't get any of this," she said,
And pointed with her fork to a broccoli slaw.
"It's bitter!" she said as she
Clinched her jaw in an unhappy grimace.

"I made that," I said,
And her eyes got big,
Her jaw unclenched and hung agape.
"I'm just kidding," I said,
"But I could've made it."

It's one thing to warn others of some deadly thing
That waits to bring a mortal fate,
But to criticize food at a church social,
Well, now that's just bad taste.

-jenn

I don't like this raspberry pie,
And I'm not going to try another bite.
I tasted one like this at church before,
And I didn't like it then.
I was told that it was good,
And that I should like it.

But I don't,
And I won't eat it anymore.

-jenn

I hope you like your bacon crisp
And all your pancakes flat.
And put too much syrup on them!
And after all of that,
Could we just go back to bed
And sleep and dream
And live in lala-land
Until such time as reality
Lines up with you and me?

-jenn

I'm out early walking in the wind.
It sounds like waves rolling out
And rolling in over the tops of the trees.
It's quiet here after the storm.
The animals are safe and warm in their burrows and nests.
Nothing is moving about.

I open my heart to the mottled sky.
I accept the duality of all nature,
My goodness and evil
And that of my family and friends.
I stand quietly on this airish hill
Where my hair blows free,
And I freely give my love again.
Yet I survey the dale
Where I live and take back my love, as well.

And now I know. I see.
The wind has blown the stale old lonesome out of me,
But just as soon as it comes again,
It will blow a fresh new lonesome in.

-jenn

By the time I rise,
The Morning Star is high.
She's painted a fresco,
Something she remembers.
She's dabbed the clouds with color
And the skies with things that made an impression
On her at some time in her youth.

She takes time to represent it fairly,
An accurate history.
The faces are the actual ones.
She remembers them so clearly,
And she saw it all from the beginning.
She's not confused
By who hit whom in the latter years of the war.
She knows who started it.

All other biographies might begin their story in the middle,
But not the frescoes of the Morning Star.
Blood still cries out from the rocks to her.
The heavens still resound
With the echoes of the injustices,
And the fairnesses,
That have ever been found to occur upon this earth.

But know that at this point in human history,
When you pick a side,
It may be based only on whom you think you saw throw the first punch.
And then again, you might be right,
But you might be very wrong.

But look to the frescoes.
Meditate on the ancientness of the Morning Star.
Make the world better wherever you are
By choosing to be uniquely you,
And loving those whom only you can love.

And when it's time for your countenance
To appear in the morning skies,
The Morning Star will smile as she paints you.
She will be sure to depict your good side.

-jenn

Two flies buzzed about while I bathed.
One got swatted,
The other, unscathed,
Continue to fly between ceiling and floor,
But was it steam from the bath,
Or something more forlorn
That made the remaining fly
So heavy and morose?
Its spiral only seemed to go downward.

I don't think flies get married,
But perhaps these two were quantumly entangled.
Some connections are Cosmic and Real like that,
Even if they are "unofficial," or "officially" labeled "bad."

But whatever matrimony the excepted nomenclature of the day
Might try to enforce as "normal" or "good,"
People and flies will feel what they will for whom they will,
Right in the face of peer pressure or
The hegemony of political correctness.

-jenn

Behold the broken hearts!
Leaves
That felt that they were unwanted
By the Trees,
Used--like so much chlorophyll.
Innocence, imminence,
Photosynthesis!
Wam, bam, thank you ma'am!

The trees say, "No!
What you don't know
Is that I had to let you go
For just this season,
But you always return
By the vernal equinox,
And I didn't know the reason, either.
Til now, I thought you didn't want me."

-jenn

I have a winter garden
Where my kale and cabbage grows,
Turnip greens and mustard
And even when it snows,
My dandelions flutter
And shine bright yellow suns
At carrot tops and vining hops
And blush chrysanthemums.

And if you come and walk between
The clusters of love and rows
Of herbs and mints
And smell the pungent tingle
That tempts your nosy nose,
Then I will walk with you,
And we will find magic in the unseen.
We'll be fed goodness and graciousness.
Our love will sprout, and stay
Forever Evergreen.

-jenn

I'm stranded on a desert island,
Or maybe that's "dessert."
All I found to eat is coconut.
I struggle to blast them open.
The milk is not that sweet,
But I've discovered the heartiness
And flavor of the meat is satisfying
Like nothing else I've consumed.
It makes me wish that I'd been marooned
A long, long time ago,
Or maybe that's "macarooned."

-jenn

The curtain is alive
When the wind is in it.
It fills and billows
And spills it's lovely
Fragrant wine.
It giggles and stares
And shrugs its shoulders
Without a second care in the world.

Its first is something no one knows,
Until the wind forgets to blow.
The cup runneth over not.
Joy is gone.
The spirit has wandered far away.
No life dancing round in the curtain today.

But somewhere
Someone is settling in,
A loving smile,
Tweaking a chin,
Nuzzling the whiskers,
Laughing,
As ten winds blow
The curtains all aglow.

-jenn

There is a source,
And it is more powerful
Than all the location
You can put together.
There is a source.
The great force of physics we might call Love,
We might call Tao, or The Way.

I used to be able to talk about it,
Without having any form of understanding.
Now, I understand it quite well,
But I can't say,
And I won't.

-jenn

Oh how I love an open window,
An open door, an open life.
I lie in my bed at night and close only my eyes.
My mind goes out, into the dark
Following the song of a lonesome cricket.
I scurry along with my nose to the trail
And my tail to a pining moon.

The stars snap their fingers and sway to the song,
The song that the lonesome cricket sings,
And the moon bobs along through the midnight sky
Like a big pale balloon that's been lost by a child.
And I am just mully-grubbin' my way to the creek
Through an airy gate someone left ajar--
Chasing my dreams out and over, across the Milky Way.

And I hope when I cross that starry river,
And shake the shimmering dust from my pelt
And shiver, and look to see
That someone has left a door open for me
Yet again.

-jenn

A storm brewed off the coast of France
And brought someone else's winds to me.
I liked these winds.
They blew cool and high and free
And made even the limbs and leaves in the tops of the trees dance.

I wanted to go and stay
Where these breezes blow,
To live and always be
Among the high cool snows
And freedom of the northern seas,
But a voice inside of me said,
"All the winds are within you."

And so I've stayed.
I made a forest grove my home,
Where not too many winds have ever blown,
But sometimes a good friend will pass through here
And bring me cheer,
And let me know I'm not alone.
And when I feel my spirit stir,
The refreshing air swirls up and even down.
The tops of the trees tremble,
And even the ground cover blows.
Then I hear the voice again and know,
"All the winds are within you."

-jenn

Certain flowers don't bloom,
But the bees still buzz.
They hover and hope
To be first when it does.

But certain flowers wait to bloom.
They smile and wave and stand the wind,
The sun, the moon, until just the right bee comes along.
And then they grin
And petals fall to make for them
A bed of roses--
Just right for the right bee,
And a night of blossoming.

-jenn

All I ever see of me is my shadow,
And depending on how my shadow has been informed,
It passes on to me its information,
Albeit limited, and somewhat distorted.

The only time I ever see my spirit,
I close my eyes and look down deep inside.
I dream when I'm awake and when I'm sleeping,
But these are just hints to the wide and spacious places that are "me."

My shadow only ever tells me gossip.
My dreams provide oases that mirage.
My heart tells me that kettle drums
At some distant Celtic Mayfair long ago
May be all that's keeping me alive.

And if I can hear the song that they are singing,
And if I can understand the ancient brogue,
My shadow will wander off to go out dancing
And leave me with my dreams to be alone.

I can enjoy the perfect rhythm of the drummer.
I can know that somewhere hearts beat gay.
And I can be as happy here as they are there
In their happy mansions of eternal day.

Somehow.

-jenn

It's a woman's prerogative
To change her mind,
Because she can want to
And not want to
All at the same time.
Because there is some strange call
To come and swim upstream,
To be caught in a moment of hormones
And the gleam of another salmon's walleye.
And yet because there is some higher logic,
Some greater sense that one cannot
Make a dollar out of fifteen cents,
Or a silk purse from a sow's ear
Or a kangaroo,
Or chicken salad out of chicken poo,
Or enlightened progeny
From DNA that's stingy or unkind.
And so, yes,
It is a woman's prerogative
To change....her.....mind.

-jenn

I think it has something to do with fishin',
I hope, or basketball,
'Cause fishin' has noodlin' and crappyin', and all those
Weird bait names.
But basketball is where I hear the term,
And it always makes me fret just a little,
So won't someone go ahead and tell me,
What's a nuttin' butt net?

-jenn

If you start the day with achin' and begs,
Some bitterness must remain.
Your quarrel is within you,
As is your kingdom.
Better to take a vow of silence
And chastity,
And eat and be satisfied.

Then take a bow at the end of the day,
Only after you've reached your destination.
Know that something has been done
Out of not doing,
Not saying.

Then sleep and dream
Of bacon and eggs in the morning.

-jenn

I think of you and me
As opposite hands on one body.
And when I spin with arms out wide, I see
My hands make a circle in the sky.
Right is left and left is right.

And now I stop.
I bring my arms up straight above my head
And clasp my hands together.
And they realize
How happy they are
To be one.

-jenn

I come to the airport at noon.
There's not a cloud in the sky over here,
But somewhere rain has canceled your flight,
And like the heavy jumbo jets,
My heart, too, is on standby.

-jenn

A man in a motorized shopping cart
Stopped me on my second pass by.
He thanked me, because he said
He was just sitting there feeling sorry for himself,
Watching the rest of the world go by him on two feet,
When he saw me go past
With my shorts up my crack,
And he thought to himself
That at least he would not be caught
Walking around walmart with a wedgie.

Glad to be of service, Sir.......

-love
jennnnnnn

No is almost the opposite of one
If we can only
Considers the letters.
On is the opposite of no
And also that of under.
So if it is beneath you
To negate a few of life's possibilities,
Will it behest you to behold
None of your dreams coming true?

If good is the enemy of the best
And the opposite of bad,
How important will it be to be had
Yet never purchased?
And how lovely to bequeath
Some innocent blunder
As the inheritor of the request.

In other words,
Serendipity provides
Beautiful answers
To those who are open to see them.
Clear your schedule
And wait for me,
And I will see you later,
Yet sooner than you can imagine.

-jenn

If you study anatomy,
You will know the amazing mechanical way
The tendons wrap.
You will see the foramen left
For vessels to pass through bone.
Or maybe they are screwholes
For some great invisible hinge
To hang us in our place at night
To open us to dreams.
And maybe the dreams download
Some great mysterious program
That lies there dormant in our brains
Until our spirit wakes
And reaches into the spirit world
With both hands to take
The beautiful living things
Promised there
And bring them
And plant them
Into the gardens of hope
That might still be.

And as we walk the rows of green,
Barefoot, and discerning
Between the peanuts and the careless weeds,
Hoeing out unwanted things
And making room for our dreams to grow,
We feel the pull on our mechanical tendons,
The whir of stress on ligaments.
Gears grind,
And we wonder if we robots
Can have a soul ?
Or if the downloads of these dreams
Are merely carrots out ahead of us
To get us up to hoe those peanuts
One more extra day ?

-jenn

The sum of peeps and chirps and howls,
Quacks and honks and mews and moos,
Grunts and whinnies and snorts and chortles
And every other sound the animals make
Can be translated to just two things:
"Mother," and "straight."
One is a cry for food and protection,
The other, a prayer to know the fastest, safest way to their daily destiny.

-jenn

Locust are subject to plagues of their own.
Hordes of them lie dead in the street, or dying.
Instead of the sky, they've pressed their buzzing wings to the road,
Upside down, on their backs.

Maybe an invisible angel of death
Came and leafed through them.
Maybe it just picked out the first hatched.
Maybe it carefully took one of every ten,
Carefully moving the decimal point over each time
On the way to the tally of decimation.

It makes me wonder what unique trait
The firstborn have to make them
Such easy prey for premature pickins.
Is it that they are more pressured to be perfect,
Or that they see a world of adults
Before other children are born,
And the confusion of what to be--
Grown or childlike, makes them resort
To extreme measures, while earthly pressures
Make them quite willing to take the bait?
Or maybe it's something we just can't see,
Something pure and innocent and weak
Lying around in their junk DNA?

-jenn

Meet me down by the mailbox.
Someone else has made the bed.
There's a mud puddle there
So you can wash your head and face,
Flutter your wings,
Get the sand and water in between
All the little places where your feathers connect.
Then maybe we can get a little sleep,
Get a good start, begin again
In the morning.
We'll bound up out of our mattresses twin,
Just like Ricky and Lucy Robin
Or Dick van Dyck and Mary Tyler Moore.

-jenn