Saturday, February 29, 2020

They said they wanted to study me,
And I smiled with pride,
And got myself ready in my best tweed
And heels and steeled myself
For how I might defend
A dissertation, if I’d ever written one,
But maybe someone liked my poetry there?

But at the university,
The shuttled me off
To the Zoology Department,
Where I was asked to strip down.
I looked around to make sure
I didn’t see any knives.
It wasn’t my poetry they wanted to dissect,
But guess again,
The story of my life?

-jenn
Your love poems
Taste pressed,
Like french coffee,
Fresh like lime.

Enjoy me now
For just this day,
This time,
While I am
Beautiful.

And we don’t 
Have to fall in love,
But we can.
We might.
We may.

-jenn 
When I came to
This foreign place
To visit him,
He gave me a fake name.
He told me what to call him,
And exactly how to say it.
It turned out to be
A dirty word
In his language.

Every time I called to him,
He snickered.
Every time I
Longed for him,
It was a joke on me.

But he told me
It was his name,
And I thought it was beautiful,
A foreign phrase
That had no meaning
Except what one was
Told that it should be.

But one day 
In a small cafe,
Where he and I sat eating,
He rose to go
And his wallet fell,
And when I called to him
To tell him,
The other patrons giggled.
His face got red,
And he glared at me.

He left me here,
Like a child,
A stranger
In a strange land
With strange customs.
The restaurant owners
Took me in,
And I began to work
At the cafe,
But I am wary of 
Who I trust to teach me
The language here,
And how I’m taught 
To say the words.
I listen to the customers,
To hear how
Regular people say them.

I am wary of everything,
And only hope
Someday 
I will find my way back home.

-jenn 
The melody of songbirds in the trees
The lonely whippoorwill 
The drill of the woodpecker 
It’s quiet here
To say the least

But in my mind
A sunny pine
And a deep place
Where the river widens
A big rock to jump off of
And lively splashes
Of laughter and cold clear water
My smile is an echo
Of this time
And place 

-jenn

Tuesday, February 25, 2020

The clamor and clang from the machine shop 
Drops and follows the men
Down the road to the pub.
The light shifts to pale
As the sun sets,
And a doe appears in the back yard
To nibble on the purple flowered mint.

I peek out my door
To watch the colors of the day
Slink away with the sun.

-jenn

Monday, February 24, 2020

I found wild berries on the mountain.
I pull my wheelbarrow up empty 
And follow it down the hillside full
And sell the berries at the market
And never have to sew.

I’ve never liked pins and needles,
Thread or cloth of any kind.
I don’t care to wield the scissors,
But I love the berries I find on the mountain.
I will leave the tailor shop behind
And hope I never have to sew again.

-jenn
I pile my hair up on my head
And pin it with a silver clasp,
And one tendril falls out sheepishly
And curls just at my jawline.
Who are you trying to seduce,
Oh wayward lock of mine?
There is no one here but me
Staring into a dusty mirror.

-jenn 
Have you seen the Milky Way tonight?
It is white as snow.
It pulls the light from my eyes 
Deep into itself.

And I am lost, here in the dark,
Like a night owl, flying
Somewhere between the airy heavens
And the hard winter earth.

-jenn
I lie awake and watch the flowers dancing on my wall
No one has told them they are “wall flowers.”
No one has labeled them, 
Or given them a name at all.

And so, not knowing how to behave,
They dance, as long as the moon is full
And shines through the roses
And honeysuckle vines on my porch,
Casting these lovely shadows to dance
On my curtain, and book shelf,
In my room.

-jenn

Sunday, February 23, 2020

She collected a cauldron of sleigh bells
And stirred them with a wooden spoon,
And the most magical melodies 
Came floating up. Tunes of random measure,
A rhythm that spoke forth rhyme,
And lyrics formed spontaneously 
That sang the woes of Time’s 
Great feats upon mankind.

And something deep within me understood,
And something quiet flowed from in my soul,
And told me words of wisdom
That spread wholeness out
Into my limbs and torso.

And now, I am ok.
I’m lonely.
I sing a song of sleigh bells
To the pines.
I’m lonely, I sing,
But I’m ok.

-Jenn

If I walk out of my room
In a daze, without saying a word,
I’m only sleepwalking.
It’s best that you don’t wake me.

If I go down as far as the turn row,
Where the light of the moon
Shows me hazy and spectral,
Don’t shake me

Til long after I’ve made it
Down the aisle,
To the place where the hay shocks 
Stand like groomsmen
Awaiting me,

Long after I’ve made my sacred vows,
And the stringed quartet
Has taken its bows,
And the receptionists swoon.
Don’t force me to wake or to speak too soon,
Or ever, til long after the honeymoon is over.

I’m only sleep walking,
So please don’t wake me
Til June, or July or 
Maybe the following May,
Or if that’s too far gone,
Give me at least til tomorrow night.

-jenn
n my little office,
I have three bottles of various colognes,
Half full, half empty.
I spray some on my hair in case
Someone comes to see me.
It’s fine for The Poet to smell 
Like oily scales and mothballs,
But, The Poetess,
She is held to an entirely 
Different standard.

-jenn

Friday, February 14, 2020

It’s a sappy sweet affair
When trees are standing tall,
And pollen blows on the wind
Through the air from the male to the female.
In the leaves that rustle, a whisper
Asks her, “Do you want it here? 
Or there?” 

And the Pecan Tree whispers back,
“Everywhere! I really don’t care.
I just want you as deliriously happy as I am.”

Because at the first tingling pollen,
That touched one place and then another,
A swarmy dither overtook her.
She’s not worried if he’s the Protandrous or Protogynous type,
Just that whatever he has shed
Is starting to effect her xylem.

Will she mate for life, or just a decade
Or a day?
Will she wait while life goes passing by?
Will she take it on the chin,
And make a million pecans by then,
While she enjoys the scintillating pollen 
Every time it blows through her blue sky?

She is a Pecan Tree, and a beauty, too,
So she will do whatever she wants to,
And some years will be lean,
But her green is new every spring,
And her roots are deep, and her dreams
Continue to flow through her sapwood
And all the way out through her crown.

And I am taking my cue from her,
For staying power and longevity,
For love and beauty and sex
And making seeds of everlasting life.
Here’s to shining in the sun and having fun
And enjoying my beloved ones, every day,
One day at a time.

-jenn 

Wednesday, February 12, 2020

I dip into an inky well
Of darkest night,
To write upon the backdrop 
Of the day,
As if I could but say to you
The things my heart thinks.

I sink into the well again, 
The dark cold waters on my skin
Baptize my thoughts away.

In crystal clear i try to write 
My words upon a clear blue sky,
But invisible unfelt feelings
Can’t be read,
And so instead, I attempt
Once more, to simply dream,
And wish that things were different.
But maybe I should wish for them to be
The very same,
The very same way they are
Between you and me.

-jenn
How do you fix an angel
With broken wings?
You can’t.
Just let her sing while she walks along the ground,
And if you can catch her,
Is it lucky?
Like a leprechaun?
No.

It’s terrible to catch an angel
With broken wings.

It’s terrible.
So never try.

Angels are made to fly and be free,
And sing from the sky,
But they cry on the ground,
And the sound they make
When they can’t fly

Is terrible.
So terrible.

-jenn 

Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Bird Lectures

“I wonder what kind of bird that is?” I asked.
“That is a sparrow,” the young doctoral candidate said.
“Oh look!” I said. “That one looks like a female blue-jay!”
“No, that is just a pigeon! There are only
Two types of birds,” he insisted,
“Sparrows and pigeons.”
“Well what is a cardinal?” I asked.
“That is just a pigeon.”
“What about the finches?”
“Sparrows,” he concluded.
“What about a hummingbird?”
“That’s actually a form of bee.”
He rolled his eyes at me,
As if my brain were dead.

“There are only two types of birds,” he slowly said,
Snapping his fingers and stamping his foot down
So hard on the floor that the windows rattled.
“Sparrows, and pigeons!” he re-insisted,
“Oh, and woodpeckers....”

I can’t wait to read his dissertation.

——

My son and I were watching the birds
Eat the seed that he had put out
On a snowy day, and he overheard
Their breakfast conversation,
And told me what they were saying
As I ate mine.

“It’s a good thing they fed us today,” said the mother blue jay,
“For where exactly would we ever have found any worms?”

“In a dog’s butt,” my son heard 
The daddy blue jay grunt matter-of-factly.

“Yummmm!” I groaned. “I’ll never hear 
The birds sing the same way again.”
———


When a bird walks on the snow,
It doesn’t sink down into it,
Because there’s really nothing to a bird.
Just some fluff, with feathers on it,
A layer of black to form an eye,
And hollow bones, so they can fly.

We might not even believe they’re real,
If we didn’t see bird-seed disappear,
And the mess they leave behind.

But the birds don’t think
There’s much to us,
Just some tufts of hair
We fuss over, and the solid bones
We’re founded on,
We grounded ones, who cannot even fly.

-jenn 

Tuesday, February 4, 2020

Metamorphing 

I’m walking in an idyllic place.
The sky is a perfect shade of gray.
Many diverse kinds of birds
Chirp and call and sing their lovely tunes.
The morning is cool,
And the soft light diffused by the clouds
Provides the consummate hue to start the day.

And then I see a cigarette 
Lying by the curb in the street.

It was night here, before this peerless morning.
Someone completely out of his wits
Took a piss in the alley.
Someone stumbled in at his door
To “I don’t love you, anymore.”

I remember when I was five.
I smile when I think of how early I’d rise.
I had a lot of work to do.
I’d stand on the top of the commode
And pull the mirrored door around
So I could see how white my teeth were,
So I could show the world on the television commercial
I was about to make there in my bathroom.
I’d put a dab of my mother’s cold cream
On my hair so it would shine.

Then, at first light, I’d go outside,
Get right to work making mud pies.
The sun would come up on me,
Up to my elbows in dirt,
But I had to work.
First I had to see 
The inventory left from yesterday.
Who had eaten up all the donuts?
Cakes were gone from my mud bakery,
And pies, and just as the sun would shine too bright,
My mother would appear at the door,
Bleary-eyed and furious, and tell me 
I would have to come in and bathe again before school.

And there would be a cigarette,
Lying soggy in the road in a puddle 
Right beside the bus stop.

I don’t know how I learned to read,
But I already knew in first grade,
And read all the books
In the elementary school library.
Then they brought me more to devour,
And I would get to sit quietly 
Away from the rest of the class
In a sunny window seat,
And from there I could see where our teacher went
When she left the room.

She’d appear for just a minute’s break
On the west side porch,
And take a cigarette and light it,
Hold it between her fingers,
Middle and index, and put it to her lips
Like the sexy movie stars on tv.
She would breathe it,
And I would see a side of her
The other children never knew.

Then she’d crush the cigarette butt
And carefully put it in her purse
And disappear,
And soon return through the classroom door
With her lipstick newly reapplied
And resume her teacherly duties with a proper,
“Now, children, we will learn...”
—-

I like to think about the future with a little f,
Since you said we couldn’t have a future with a big F.
I laugh because I don’t have a future with myself, much less with you.
I think the future is over-rated,
Or maybe it’s just f’d up.
But while you told me all about it,
I just stared at that cigarette you threw
Down on the ground,
Because I knew you already had a girlfriend .
——-

Everyone else can be themselves.
He or she can walk into a room
And do whatever he or she 
Would naturally do.
I, alone must be aware
Of my self-presence.
I must be extra polite,
Walk just right,
Speak delicately.

Everyone else can be themselves.
I have to travel light,
And lightly, because 
I’m ballsy as hell.
So I’ll keep quiet
Til someone needs someone to yell,
And then, you better let me do it,
Because there might not be
A second chance
To get this right.
Sometimes it’s true, one needs
To speak softly and carry a big stick,
And sometimes.... one needs a great screamer
To be on his or her team, 
To show the world the defense means business.
And sometimes all one really needs
Is a cigarette.
——-

But not me!
I’m not allowed 
To smoke or drink
Or need anything.
A constant stream of things to do
Keeps me out of trouble,
And yet I wonder if it prevents me
From thinking about tomorrow .
Thinking of what I might truly need 
Or want in the immediate future,
The future with the little f,
The Future with the Big One.
—-

“Do you smoke after sex?”
“I don’t know, I never checked!”
I hear the canned laughter 
Of the variety show on TV, 
And the quick cut to commercial.
I can’t find my babydoll .
I can’t find my joke book.
I wanted to go on the boat tonight 
With my parents, but they wouldn’t let me.
I’m so tired. I brush my teeth and go to bed,
And no one had to tell me to do that.
I open the window in my room
That I share with my two brothers,
To let in the cat with sea-green eyes.
I hug it up to me and sigh.
It stretches out right beside me
On my pillow, and we both sleep.
But I know in the morning when I wake
To open the window to let it out,
There will be cigarette butts on the ground
Just outside my window pane.
And I will realize that I 
Have smelled cigarette smoke
All through the night.
———

But today is another day.

-jenn 




Monday, February 3, 2020

Dark Star

I want to be your dark star.
I want you to sing to me
The way I sing to you,
In an ultra-sonic binaural beat.
I don’t want to be the one you see,
As if you’re seeing someone,
But the one you feel
All during the day,
As well as the night.

I want to be your dark star,
The dark horse of your novel
Who comes to take you away 
From the man in the white hat,
Who’s come to take you away from yourself.
I want to take you back 
To the heart of the matter,
The dark matter of the beginning,
If that’s where you want to go.

I want to be your dark star.
And if you do not want to go,
You can come to me,
And in the deep space anti-shine,
Feel me pulling the light out of your eyes.
Feel me absorbing your twinkling smile
And your warm life into my very reversal of time,
Into my starving, insatiable heart,
The heart and soul of this dark star.

-jenn