Niches Carved. Handholds.

Today I barely pick up my slipper feet but amble outside.
My cupped hands suggest holler clear across to ridge

where cars on the farthest ribbon float like toys or tin angels.

A fence runs its length in front of me, pocked with afterthoughts —

niches carved in the wall.
Four separate fist indents. I ache for treasure.

A locket to bear a tender face.

Above my lazy vacation sightline, hunchback mountain
shadowing me since girlhood

with pastels so somber, any licked thumb

could smudge. As if pools of wilting golden leaves,
an ache in the ancient divets. One dog howls

and then, a country rooster, satisfied. Here where
Saturday is but half started, a metal fleur de lis leans against dry muddy.

Land swoops up from mid-horizon and one house pins down
the crest of creosote wave. I imagine
shelf contents in the wall where there are none —

Burnt paper, romantic

secrets. Slipping film strips.

But, empty spaces hush. Ruddy no man’s land reminds me of digging
in dirt. Handfuls. What would I choose to prop up —
Chipped Madonna statuette with her head

forever bent.

Acorns for a squirrel.

I attempt to lift my eyes as

sun shuns and melancholy down sifts

low at the soft kneel of foothills. Storm sinks.

Clouds interrupt.

I hear companions’ footfalls through the house alongside.

Inside, a challenging staircase. Others I adore are elsewhere.

Comments

Grit and Sunlight

What springs up: insistence in this persistent mother of mine (still breathing) Even busy ashes from a rescued urn float up reconstituted as morning dew She unfolds her tendril arms from shadow (shaking just five days ago as if in temporary surrender) (that moment when I am less certain of her longevity) this woman ever present (anyone’s mother) aging when even the most spindly clover of her fragile skin captures the sunrise light like anticipation’s shower blood underneath all humming bird or spores from her heart and in her mouth inhale (frightened) breath exhale grit inhale (certain) breath exhale grit

Open Mic, Cafe Babar

I remember arriving, not the prettiest but appealing to certain bards in the back room, entering through the Castro Valley corner door, walking the postage stamp sized Cinzano bar curated by a man from Detroit who named his establishment after a certain French elephant in a children’s book I arrive with budding consciousness around politically correct solidarity for disheveled neighbors, entering the cigarette lit night rising to tin siding ceiling to floor thumping insistence Bruce and Joie and David and Laura and John, their ash and sweat accumulating as I waited patiently for my place on the crumpled sign-up sheet Today, three decades later, I sit in a Santa Fe gallery named simply Here, and a poet reads to us of roadrunners and a bear and a continuation of the call for preservation of our environment There is an otherworldly hum outside the window of leaded glass The owner sidles up behind me and pushes the frame down to contain what we came to hear I have applied lipstick

A Matter of Travel

Solstice, 2019, for Tracy 1. And cross borders we do often without leaving our houses. Our bodies dream of gardens. Our hands flutter as feeling exits as we press hard against the solid entry door. I type the names of cities. My search reveals rivers, airfares, temperatures in July. 2. Seeking sleep, I am transported through music piped into tiny earbuds. While on an island my father has two seizures in the night. His ten children fly to one another with cautionary fright, typing. Time zones vary from each cell phone exclamation. Two sisters, you and I, raise questions that barely touch down for others but I witness you. 3. By morning we’re assured was merely fainting, and I reconsider change of plans. No emergency to rush to his quiet side. I walk no farther instead to this table for eggs, an English muffin. Arrive inside my individual conclusions. Concern that happiness, once again, is quickly stymied.

As Mourning Doves Persist

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