A fond farewell

As I say farewell to this special place, 

I take a photograph of these, 

The first of its flowers to greet me 

And the last to see me go, 

Knowing, as one does, with photos, 

That I’ll catch sight of them 

When I’m scrolling through the memories 

And smile, remembering the birds nest 

That was there when last I came: 

Each time, a gift, as if to say 

That we are always welcome here, 

And the house is as happy to have us 

As we are to rest within its walls. 

Can’t wait to come again!

Morning after blues

Lying in bed in the morning 

Remembering dinner the night before, 

Worrying… 

Does everyone do this? 

Analyze the subtle cues 

We may have missed in last night’s gathering? 

Wonder if we talked too much or too little, 

Said something wrong or laughed too loud 

Or failed to include someone in the conversation… 

As light slowly fills the room I raise the blinds. 

The haze that drifts over the mountain 

Has already faded away by the end of this poem, 

But the unease lingers.

I wish I knew

I wish I knew 

Where good paintings come from; 

Could tap automatically into that source — 

Not because I hope to have something to sell, 

But because it would be nice to trust 

That when I put my brush to canvas 

The results will make me smile…

The course of history

Like this stellars jay, 

Examining the lawn for potential food, 

We look back over our past, 

Hoping to find the roots of our behaviors, 

Both personal and communal: 

The mistakes our parents may have made, 

The choices we made, raising our kids, 

Historical events that might — or should — 

Have been handled differently; 

Rules we should have made 

Or shouldn’t have broken — 

All the things that brought us here, 

To Now, this moment, where we sit, 

Staring out at nothing, 

Worried about what’s going down 

 And wondering how to change

The course of history.

Denied access

Inside, looking out at the gift of a beautiful day, 

My heart aches for all the people 

 Who are outside, looking in; 

Unwelcome and excluded; 

Denied access to the life every human deserves 

By circumstances not of their own making.

Brief celebrity

The amaranthine campion blossoms, 

Gleaming unexpectedly in the afternoon sun 

Call out from across the broad expanse of lawn, 

And I creep closer, like paparazzi 

 Hoping to catch them drinking 

Or maybe dancing in the light 

Before their evanescent celebrity fades.

Forgetting

Over time I have forgotten 

That daisies come in several different varieties, 

Some tall, some really short; 

Some that bloom earlier, or later, 

Or show off lots more petals or larger centers 

Than the ones that now are languishing 

Beneath my plum tree 

(Is this their natural cycle, 

To grow brown and lie down, 

As if their backs all hurt too much to stand, 

Or are they dying because I forgot to water them?) 

I’ve forgotten other things as well, 

But would rather have forgotten 

The things that wake me, 

Or still can make me cry: 

Man’s inhumanity to man, woman, and child; 

The yips of the coyotes as they feast;

The shrieks of the forest as it burns…