Not a team player,
Change likes to spike the ball –
first to the net, a master
derailing strategy
I sit on the sidelines –
age having dulled reflexes –
amused that I ever thought
I could beat such an opponent.
(Image my own)
Category: life
Burrs
How many winter walks
ended with burrs matted
in curly Wheaton hair?
How you wriggled
to escape the grooming;
how we laughed at
jokester antics?
Your spirit still fills
the empty spaces
I hear the jingle
of your collar, catch
a whiff of terrier fluff
Pull on an invisible leash
whenever I encounter burrs.
(For our former, cherished companion, whose memory still lingers. Image mine)
No Adjectives Necessary
Robin is absent
Winter’s silence
inviting retreat
Children embrace adventure
while I, behind panes,
watch fluctuations
await harbinger’s return.
(This poem was written for a challenge from my poetry circle: to write a poem without adjectives. Image my own).
Pondering Abstracts
The certainty of yesterday
has slipped our grasp
light deflecting truth
tosses us into the abstract
I ponder process
and outcomes,
will my mind to carry me
gliding between thermals
dissolving into vapours
Some realities
too hard to bear –
dislodged
we tread the indeterminate.
(Poem originally appeared on One Woman’s Quest II, December ’19. Image my own)
What My Body Knows: A Tanka
(Another poem written for Twitter. Image my own)
Gliding
In isolation, I am rock –
solid, fearless, present
Memories are moon-bows –
miracle of love, whispers
of what might have been
Will not let current fear
shape me; I am tethered
to faith, gently gliding.
(Image my own)
Intangibles
Mother followed all the trends –
Scarsdale and grapefruit diets,
minis and maxis,
platforms and pumps –
reaching for an ideal
my child’s mind
could not comprehend
Father dreamt of a voice makeover
had flown his ancestral roots
in search of…what?
I did not know
I learned that men
were to be pleased,
and compassion
was a woman’s role
and it was folly to hazard
confrontation when alcohol
was in the mix,
Intangible as life was
I deduced that secrets –
the avoidance of scandal –
rendered women ineffective
and by the very circumstance
of my birth, I was tainted,
weighted by shame
destined to endure
pain as love
invested in
my worthlessness
Except life is evolution
and rage emerges
from oppression
and conviction
smashes the impotence
of ideals, embraces
the abstracts
of fluidities,
and merging out of shame
I see that struggle
is opportunity
and that rewriting legacies
is an honourable goal
and I do have power
in any given moment…
only wish
I had known it
sooner.
(Art my own)
Life is Like This
Biting, the sun’s brilliance,
nestled in a cornflower blue sky –
competition for mustard gold,
tangerine orange, and chartreuse –
leaves shimmering this Autumn morn
The vividness of colours too sharp
for just awakened eyes – begs retreat.
I contemplate this vision, think:
life is like this –
too beautiful, at times for words;
glorious perfection.
In a blink, the sky changes
white clouds forming a backdrop,
Autumn wind tossing the tree about,
branches dipping, pull apart,
and the harmony of the last moment
is gone, and I think:
Life is like this –
turning without notice,
what once was balance, suddenly lost,
and we are left spinning.
I can hear it now – wind rushing
against the windowpane, taunting:
Change! Change is coming!
I know what it speaks is true, for
life is like this: ever fluctuating, and
the reminder is bittersweet,
my heart, reluctant to let go of Summer
knows it’s okay: it’s just the way of life.
(A rewrite of a rewrite. Image my own)
Nothing is Lost
The garments of past successes
are not lost in life’s shuffle
but reapplied with new panache
What once served to polish presentation
now accentuates gained wisdom –
service is service
whether salaried
and noteworthy
or humbly given
I apply my passion to a higher cause
and am rewarded with space to grow
and companionship along the way
Discovering that life experience
bears worth – a liberating
and empowering awakening.
(Image my own)
Self Portrait in Colours
Found an old diary –
days when I prayed to the angels
painted myself white, believed
in a God that cared about personal
agendas – painted myself pathetic
Took me back to days of heartbreak,
when I pined after a man, unavailable,
painted myself pink – an altruistic heart
yearning after the unrequitable,
willing to sacrifice, change –
painted myself foolish
Read between the lines about a woman
so desperately co-dependent she’d risk it all,
painted herself yellow, projected sunshine,
believed in fairy tale endings, threw away
dignity, sanity – painted herself delusional
Wondered how she’d ever survive,
knew that life intervened in the end,
painted her broken –
and somehow she found strength,
moved on, made better choices,
learned to love herself,
painted herself indigo.
(Self Portrait in Colours first appeared here Aug/2016. Image my own)
One Woman's Quest 