Rich enough

Do those who are rich enough bring a photographer
On their honeymoon? It is difficult to always
Take pictures of only one person or flag down an
Innocent 3rd party, makeshift photographer.

I guess most people who are rich enough
To bring them along get them for free – paparazzi.

Ugh

Masses uprooted
More fastidious than the previous

Back and Forth

She back paddles and avoids
His longing glance
Her intentions backlit like
An antique silhouette
And a back draft of self-consciousness
Stifles her wit
He has psoriasis and sunburn

Before the doorbell

Pork chops and pasta without sauce
Litter the dining room table
Once fine china, finely cracked
Like dry winter skin,
Holds canned peas, butter.
His bouncing knee rattles
Disarrayed silverware –
He never knows if knives are
Left or right – and he
Gulps down another glass
Of pale red wine.
Maybe he was mistaken,
Today is not the day or
She never really said yes.

Shelly

We were still waiting for the bus two hours later, and Shelly kept pinching my wrist.
"Do you really need something this time?"
She innocently nodded up at me and stuck her thumb in her mouth.
"You know what patience is, right?" Another nod, as innocent as the first, but this time she wouldn't look me in the eye.
"Shelly, your mom's not gonna be happy if I have to tell her that you were bad today." Her thumb popped out of her mouth and she pulled her spine a little straighter: at attention. I felt bad threatening her, but for Christsake, she kept derailing my train of thought. Really my worry was not that Shelly's mom might growl at me after hearing about her behavior. Shelly was a great kid. No, I was worried that I might never see Shelly again.

She often reminded me of a marionette; I'd pull her strings or her mother or Carl would play with them. I hated dictating her actions, but I hated her mother's control even more. I truly believed that without me, Shelly would have to deal with the torture, too. I knew it because sometimes at night I would wake up to the quiet whistling through her night-brace when she had crept down the hall for the safety of my bed. I don't think her mom ever entered her room at night; I always told Shelly to lock her door but I think Shelly feared that she might lock the good out of her life along with the bad.
I never had a lock on my door. Shelly's mom found out I put a chain-lock on my bedroom door once and the poor doorframe splintered from her angry crowbar. I was the next to deal with that crowbar's wrath and I immediately ran to Shelly's room to unscrew the chain I had placed there earlier that day before the crowbar found it, too. That was a long time ago; I don't think Shelly could even reach that chain, but for a few hours it made me feel a little calmer.
I think I was about Shelly's age when I quit calling her mom.

Paranoia

People are easier to offend as I get older
Or maybe I’m more offensive

How long is soon?

Lost and You Found

Kiss me again for I cherish your will.
Touch me again for I train my face to
Follow your hand.
Make my will yours and yours mine.
Make more out of nothing and nothing
Out of strife.
Light white candles to symbolize love
Love light in the living room and in the polished heart
Perhaps someday I’ll open my eyes to
A wrinkled face with a starched, bright spirit.
Perhaps you will notice my grey and run
Your fingers through it.
It was a moment, sudden as snowflakes
“Maybe” will become our life, but press
On because…
Because I see more in your gestures than anyone
Because I want to welcome you to my heart
Because my eyes want to kiss your face
We will bask in the sun’s carefully laid mortar
Put others in their place and know that we
Have found our place
A home, a dog, a life, a cliché that is
Only ours.

February 18, 2006