Bridesmaid


Tonight's nightmare mistress,
the dressmaker
won't let me be
with her pins
and stitching needles
jumping through silk
and then flesh,

avoiding depth of blood,
just enough
not to bleed
and ruin the dress;

nothing falls like this dress
or touches
like these seamstress implements,

cruel against veins with scissors,
sharp side faced in, but,
still jarring,
measuring what's become of me,
without salve

for the porcelain shell,
covering what's churning
holy, underneath.

Say the neck aches under those lips,
flushed rose
before smothering
into gardenias,
a perfectly fitted swan.

Say the throat will, once again,
feel the petal of that ache.




. . .

"I swear I'll never wear a pair of shoes..."

She just won't keep her shoes on. I put them on, but she's a Houdini, so I've pretty much given up. Sometimes, she'll accept socks, but only if they are brightly striped or polka-dotted, and even then, they are soon off and in her mouth!

I think every baby deserves a good playlist, so I've made one of some of her (already) favorite songs. These aren't songs I've just chosen for her, they're songs that she's danced to and adored the most whilst listening to lots of music!

Her birthday (and mine) is coming up very soon. She'll be a year old. Impossible! I'm getting her some drums. (sshhh.) I won't be getting her any shoes!

I know I'll never receive a birthday gift as incredible as the one I got last year!





. . .

i heart baseball

I need to find my quiet place. Where did it go? I seem to have lost my handy map and compass to show me the way. Where I am now, there's so much noise, too many lights. I think I need to concentrate on the little, simple things that bring joy. One of those things is baseball and more specifically, the Red Sox. My most beloved player is Manny Ramírez. Ramírez is great to watch because he's seemingly just fumbling around out there, having fun and not even caring about winning, but is still remarkably successful. To me, he always looks like he's just about to stumble over and only semi-aware of his surroundings. I don't know how he does it. Wouldn't it be lovely to be excellent at something without even trying? (Well, perhaps you are!) Maybe he's just very enlightened...you know, the Yoda of the Red Sox..."no worries, it's with me"...or, what's that Yoda quote?..."do or do not; there is no try"...isn't that it?


(Manny with red dreds & his St. Patty's Day threads!)


Another player that particularly interests me is the much hyped Daisuke Matsuzaka. He's purported to throw the somewhat mythical gyro ball...something I look forward to witnessing first hand! We'll see if it's just hype. Even if it is just hype, it's a most amusing hype they're creating and could be valuable just for its intimidation factor!



. . .

****{my whole, vulnerable self-portrait project is here}****

(for the 11.5 people who even slightly care & one of 'em's my Mama! ;)

. . .

Addendum: Gyro Ball!!

Mode of Transportation

I float, repairing, above this world,
as a dew bathed newborn, fractured and burning
feathers, with sharp edges, into mountain rock,
long guarded by sprawling pines, flying and bending
with storm, with love whispered wings, with chimes
made of bird bones, with streetlight memory
carried in flat distance, across quarry, through ash,
from a crumbling balcony, carved in leaves and tulips,
faced by my bed and its latticed pillows, tied strong
and launched to passenger pigeons, roost ruling
and circling Venus' deep, songstress volcanoes,
sinuous rills and lovelorn structures we've knit
into fingerless gloves, too warm for the sun's proximity.

I can always feel it first in my knees,
just raw skeleton to gnaw and clean,
supporting spared body tissue's thunder clouds,
exactly prior to the tremble and clap of tumultuous
hair and air, like rain bullets captured in hand grasps,
squeezed dry of velocity and bitter minerals.

This transmission holds your echo, still biting inner arm.
I know I could die of your teeth and pressing imprints, easily.


. . .

(ok,this just rocks.)

(ran 5 miles today. just put salted pasta water on to boil. lotsa dishes to wash in my granny apron. i'm getting there.)

and the sea closed in, around each head, with a soft sigh...


from, Marina of the Rocks:

"You have a taste of tempest on your lips
And a dress red as blood
Deep in the gold of summer
And the perfume of hyacinths—But where did you wander
Descending toward the shores, the pebbled bays?

There was cold salty seaweed there
But deeper a human feeling that bled
And you opened your arms in astonishment naming it
Climbing lightly to the clearness of the depths
Where your own starfish shone.

Listen. Speech is the prudence of the aged
And time is a passionate sculptor of men
And the sun stands over it, a beast of hope
And you, closer to it, embrace a love
With a bitter taste of tempest on your lips.

It is not for you, blue to the bone, to think of another summer,
For the rivers to change their bed
And take you back to their mother
For you to kiss other cherry trees
Or ride on the northwest wind.

Propped on the rocks, without yesterday or tomorrow,
Facing the dangers of the rocks with a hurricane hairstyle
You will say farewell to the riddle that is yours."


-- Odysseus Elytis, Orientations, Translated by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard

. . .


Is it too early to start dreaming of summer, while Spring (she's a shy one, too!) isn't even quite sure if she's ready to be here, yet? Mayhaps, but I am anyway! I have only two goals for the summer (because I'm just ambitious like that) and one is to get myself on a surfboard. I've never been on one which is rather pathetic for a girl who's lived the majority of her life only a short way from the ocean. I've been on one of those little, boogie boards, but we all know that's just not the real thing. My other goal is to get myself a most excellent bikini because last summer I couldn't really wear one due to a still giant, baby tummy! (deep, non?)

Ah, she will be here soon enough, along with her tender heart and fragrant blooms! Joyful knowledge!

. . .

The Heart's in the Tool Chest


Each time the hand closes,
reluctant, underneath,

stuck there, unable to move on

from rendered putty, soft hollow,
flushed, June berry heat

slumped across makeshift

worktable, for this work,
our work to work,

rattling loose nails and scraping
slivers disjointed, forever in skin.

This will change things, we know
and keep working, faithfully intent

on finding that line along the scalp

where only the maker of the marks

will see the marks, and then
only from a telescopic eye

safely cloistered, unmarked.


- - -

***{Highway Heart}***

- - -

goodnight, you hiding full-moon. c'mon out. poke-poke.

Weathered


A mistake was in my back pocket
the whole time, folded into

origami iris, just waiting
for Spring's light through sails

to unfold and bloom paper petals,
wilting in palms, easily crumpled

and dashed to the wind, into
white wave crest of sea swirl

where she found it and swam it
deep under, to feed her starfish,

hungry for sweet-cream fragments
of divine longing, glowing with

teeth, sinful only in unrelieved
aching to bite, chew and swallow,

hiding the evidence, exquisitely
reconstituted and sent back to shore

to be sifted for treasure, found
and back-pocketed, again, as token.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

addition: imagining it into being

when i wrote that poem up there, i was suffering from
serious ocean crave and thinking about a particular, hidden
cove on cape cod. shortly afterward, i found out i'd been
given the opportunity to spend part of this june in a cabin
on that very cove! (woot!) um, is it june, yet?see this post
for my itinerary while i'm there!

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Happy Birthday Grammy Mary...
wherever you are,
I hope there's a sandy beach
and fluffernutter sandwiches.

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~