Don't worry: I haven't vanished, merely been too surrounded by people to write. I will offer the following words, however, and you can fill in the blanks:
African violets.
Pileated woodpecker holes.
Bacon.
Coffee.
Coffee.
Coffee.
Ice skates.
Beagle.
Grace Kelly.
Scotch.
OK Dawn, here are your words back:
ReplyDeleteAfrican violets
sit drooped agains the edges of their pots,
victims of my distraction,
my failures of water and light.
I should tend them like children
but I am an empty-nester and selfish.
Pileated woodpecker holes
and the eternal tap-tapping warn
me that there is more to life
than bacon and eggs, mimosas
at Sunday brunch.
Bacon is curling in the pan
in mimic of the edges
of the violets against the clay pot
as if to alert me to my duty
to work harder to care.
Coffee is a means, or is it an end
to the lackluster attitude
I foster? If a poem were a cup
of Joe, would I let it grow cold
and stale, ignore its taste?
Coffee is not a poem, not a violet,
and I am not lazy. I am filled with stuff
to make and do and fix. I am thick
with nerves that ravel and fray
and no amount of
Coffee will fix that.
If the weather turns colder,
if the ponds thicken too,
I may take a break,
water something inside, then find
ice skates
long forgotten blades of glory
and go outside where
no gardens beg for attention,
where our Beagle voices the moon.
Grace Kelly did not have to water
her African violets, walk a dog,
or brew her own coffee. She had a prince
to arrange all that and more.
But I think she poured her own
Scotch.
I took this poem to my critique group yesterday and they loved it too, thought it hilarious and poignant, especially the part where the speaker first bashes herself for being lazy, then later defends herself! Oy. I do love a good challenge though and when you threw down the words, I just had to....
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