You don’t want to lay down, but it’s not time to run,
so you arch, throw yourself, scream, dive, and you hate me.
I bring you to myself and calm your body down.
You tire out then wake slightly, force some side-eye
like you trust me, and I slide you to your bed
as seamlessly as I can, deep-breathing in your ear
until you’re long-lost. You sleep long enough to little more
than recover, sit up in your bed and smile, start whining for me.
I say, “Come here,” and you wedge between my thighs,
contentedly rest your head on my leg, and you need me.
I pat your back, so you lean your face on my stomach.
You’ve forgiven me. Oh, you see your twin has the doll you like,
so you squeak, forget me. You go out to the world,
glance backwards at me, loving me, and carry on.
Tag: parenting
Daddy
Sometimes I think the funniest thing about him is that I found him normal-
Getting pulled over, breaking down, breaking back in,
my bloody hand from climbing a fence to get to school and the mysterious sock
that we used to clot, and how that was God.
Rock walls tied to the truck while directing traffic on the interstate
so that ducks could pass- It was SMOOTH AS BUTTER! BOWL OF SUGAR! WHOO-Read More »
Laps
Sweet girl, eyes shining, endlessly dying
for attention she knows I can give-
what she shows with her lips
that she wants: Soft smile, chestRead More »
Precious Things
Clustered leaves form a nest for the cloud
as I lie below, the tree’s outstretched arms
strengthened and still, waiting for the sky’s crown
to up and flit away, as I sit upon the tree’s feet
like a second weight, fragile as a burden,
heavy as royalty.
jumping
I like to jump.
Jump is the good thing for me.Read More »
Alana’s Song
It was the calm before the storm
that stole my breath
with its icy silence.
In those everlasting seconds,
instead of his raging words’ predictable humming,
the still left you wondering what would be coming.
His face wouldn’t wear its usual anger, but a death-like grief,
as though he knew what monster would soon be unleashed.
‘Don’t hold it in!’ I was dying to cry to him.
‘That makes its bursting that much more violent!’
I did what I could- I anticipated, and how I hated
the calm before the storm.
Before the calm, you could see the storm clouds brewing,
but the churn of the sky- it was so close to soothingRead More »
On Being an Ideas Person
After a month of nearly falling off the bottom of the earth,
Ma placed me in my bed, where I woke imagining
feeling wide-eyed, refreshed, wondrous of where I was-
jumping off the bed, landing in flexible splat as impossible
as the dogs I used to try to draw were ugly.
I didn’t really know how dogs’ heads or human bodies worked,
but I wanted a Lisa Frank retriever and my butt to be in the air,Read More »
Heights, Defiance, and Things at Stake
No matter your imaginings and dreams,
gravity, a mere theory, not really proved,
preached by grown-ups, strikes you true-
You’ve never managed to fly away
or stop their pulling your feet back to
the ground, your head out of the clouds.
Your grown-ups haven’t stayed starry-eyed.
Danger, of course, you take as even less than theory-Read More »
Grandpa, On Nature
Seen in the twilight,
the robin,
bouncing like quarter notes,
is blue as the walls in a boyhood bedroom,
and the ashen,
pewter, marbled squirrel,
arcing
as whole notes,
is blue as the moon’s backlit clouds,
their waves-
wisps reflecting
the midnight sky.
Darlin’
I only consider you deep in the winter,
summer, spring, and fall.Read More »
Alphabet Ravine 