Category: life

Raven and Snake

That day, crossing the parking lot,
raven swooped past, snake in clasp –
I took it as a sign, hurried my steps.

The ward nurse stopped me,
revealed the end was near,
appointed me bearer of news.

Me, whom you loved to hate –
lashed with brash comments,
unforgiving of my youth.

Unsurprising, your wrath,
and then the threats –
to be cut from your will

Deeply ingrained the need
to hate, to blame – lawyer
didn’t comply, I remained

Represented you in death,
sorry for a life of lies ,
how often you had to pretend

to love men,
to not be lonely,
that alcohol solved all

Miss you even now –
your caustic presence
irreplaceable, left a hole.

Don’t regret finding you,
getting help, staying
bedside as death knocked.

You’d do the same –
intrinsically linked,
the raven and the snake.

(Linked to Reena’s Exploration Challenge where the prompt is to write about sudden, magical events.)

Truth and Contrasts

Dark this passage,
blustery the winds
that rattle the glass,
cold seeping through cracks,
light receding.

prabhakar-1

Life, we are sold,
should be parties
and castles – dreams
without limits –
disingenuous campaign

Truth lies somewhere
in-between –
elusive, yet enticing –
I would exit this isolation
shake the starkness
for but a glimpse.

(Images supplied by Reena’s Exploration challenge.  Also inspired by Ragtag Community’s prompt: blustery, and Fandango’s: disingenuous.)

 

The Toll

Am not the woman my children once called Mother –
can see the disappointment in their anger-blotched
expressions, feel the constraint in their voices –

distance between us tugs on my heart, plays with
my conscience, as if illness is choice – a contrived
plot to rob them of their expectations –

hope they can forgive me before it’s too late;
hope they can forgive themselves.

Dance of Redundancy

Re-
dun-
dant,
these
rituals
by which 
I define myself –
find purpose, validate
my being – I create herculean
tasks, ignore God’s role, the cycles
of nature; script myself responsibility –
a dramatic starring role with no applause,
and in the end, when light has given over to dark
and this body has failed me, will objectivity set me free
or shall I return to do it all again…a hypnotic spiral dance?

(Inspired by Willow Poetry’s Challenge:  What Do You See?  Featured image is the prompt.)

Lost Directions

Partnered once, with compassion –
believed in power of human touch,
dedicated self to caring, certain
I’d found my body of work

Time and circumstance intervened;
I drifted, lost in an eddy of confusion,
marital fray ending in separation –

Life moves in circular cycles, and
I revisit that work now, wonder if
parts are salvageable, viable –

fragments outdated, irrelevant –
compassion still holds merit,
what if I let it drive, put ego
in the passenger seat –

would she steer us down one-way
streets, against the flow to traffic,
rattle elusive confidence –

without trust in process, I lack
assurance of youth’s glory –
would not survive the scramble

Circular lines bypass, spiral;
we are not meant to go back;
must breathe and stop grasping.

(Lost Directions first appeared here in October 2017.  I have edited it and resubmit for my weekly challenge: compassion.)