the horn of Styx signals the all aboard

I

and suddenly we are all fans

of the the dead and dying 

II

I’ve over-outwardedly reached

and been singed buy a failure

to believe the best from others 

as they take-take-tell assume 

and others the best of me

when at my lowest kicked

while low and down

III

she takes her love away

and my lap gets cold

love-dust left

on my clothes clinging 

kids’ insults were creative in the ‘70s

when the words flew…

your mother wears combat boots 

I always replied with “I wish.”

Mother left with everything that wasn’t nailed down

I

you are you, you know 

your things not mine;

trust I know my things 

are mine for the knowing

your way is your way

your way not mine

trust I know my way

is mine for the doing 

II

took a long time to earn

all my skits-n-skats internal;

the collection of pinned things

and legs struggling not to, still

hindsight never woke

in wee hours to worky-work

the one to five jobs

and smith the words of learning 

No, I did that. I. Did. That.

III

Mother never got mad

Mother never advised

Mother read her romance 

Mother lit the gas

full grown and feeling

too much at four, at little fifteen 

I figured the sums and deficits

for Father puzzling through 

this and that floundering 

for decades into overmorrow 

of owning my knowing 

and figuring what to do

“Took a world of trouble took a world of tears…” ~ Square One, Tom Petty

assuming doormat-cy is poking the goat

not loud: not demanding 

commanding only when 

an introvert is required only

because the fan is flinging 

wildly, mansplain-ively

in the quiet speaking sure;

deferring to others accords

when fixed dates afford;

but all-goods and okays

are not doormat-cy and

assuming such is no way 

to poke the Goat

in the crevice without

I

“get ‘er done; up an’ at ‘em”

your words drug me, young

from slumber into the day

and in the crevice without 

Nature or Nurture 

full-grown and gangly I hid away

II

too same in our disposition 

I think…will I become you? 

silently tune-turned inward? 

after all 

we both force-forged light from dark

that tinges every fiber

of our body-soul-mindedness

rethinking, I ‘spose not

we leaned in toward

paths divergent after all

somewhere somehow someway

‘sides, how can I become you

when even becoming me is a chore

III

without focus I walkabout

to where the searing light of summer 

into gray eyes blue-green seeps

into a place in the sun where 

the hours of yestermorrow

haunt in a haze of light mist

IV

while too soon will you away 

to drift to ethers’ kiss

and the dark will win the day

over nights of dreams

filling the years we missed

“…all the days of our lives…” ~ Never Land, The Sisters of Mercy 

bits-n-Bobs

I’m not quite fixed

or wholly mended

even after twenty-3

years of breaking 

you took too much 

then he took more

‘til bits-n-Bobs

friend and father

were all there was

but I ‘spouse she

took the most, Mother 

those 7-teen years

of clay forming 

flaming out

propane ran out last night

right before my shower 

ten days before moving

should be 103 degrees 

fahrenheit, 39 plus c

that day I’ll be glad

rising too soon

getting it done

one of the kitchen bulbs

the weird, long kind

is flickering, flaming out

I’m not sure where to buy a new one

sponge bath wasn’t bad

I let the water boil

the clothe was scalding

pores opening I could breathe

I don’t breathe these days

I walk I sit with time

heart ker-thump-ing loud

Birdie loves my singing

“…momma loves her babe…”

“you slip out of your depth and out of your mind…” Thin Ice, Pink Floyd