If Only, If Only
if only, if only
the stars weren’t so lonely
with great space between
tell me, what does it mean
might we now in time
be closer than rhyme
inspired by Annie at What the Woman Wrote
(https://whatthewomanwrote.wordpress.com/)
and Louis Sachar in Holes
(Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1998)
My Own Valentine
(prose poem)
My own little Valentine celebration. I guess we celebrate feast days, though these are the days in which the saints have died. Martyrdom—we celebrate? Well, I bought little round pink plates with small square napkins to match. I am drinking coffee with little croissants on one of those pink plates, dabbing with a small square napkin. Watching the pope visit Mexico.
Where is love? Is it there? Is it here? Is it intertwined through both places and all other places? And the people? Are we bound in red silken ties of love? Free to move yet tied so that, when we might fall, others are there gently (remember, silk) to pull us up and on.
Quizás.
Goodness, the president of Mexico is good-looking. He speaks of “a better community” (translated), “a better society.” A better world, I imagine. Why not? Here’s a chance to speak of objectives and ideals in a country toward which too many look askance.
Quizás.
Endure Oregon Protest
They are still in Oregon.
The protest goes and has
Closed in. A leader, Cliven
Bundy, was arrested.
“Cliven” could be a past-
participle word for
“Cleave” (I don’t know
that it was)—an odd word
cleave: on its own, it would
seem to mean to cut into
two, yet it is the word used
for bonding in marriage
talk. Maybe the ideas is
that in marrying we slice
ourselves off one plant
and in a cleaved (or cliven)
state are grafted to another.
From both parts, then, new
growth is hybrid-formed—
and was such unity made
made here? Since one last
leader was taken, it would
not seem so; disunity, like
bad harmony, sounds from
final voices that endured.
Not to say that protest by
occupying and with guns
is a better way, for it is not.
But someone should really
hear what they have to say—
I’m not partisan in this
for feeling for both sides.
I simply wish equality imbued.
Everyone should be heard.
Everybody gets a turn. Not
A game—but how we should
have it. All the same.
Almost Always, Haiku
In spring love might turn
If you’re there to plant with me
Almost and always
Happy Tails, Happy Trails
I grew up with cats, with
Dogs, partly with a horse
(an entire horse), some
Guinea pigs, I think, and
Fish I could not relate to
There was a rabbit (maybe
Two rabbits—you know
How they are), a rescued
Bird
I met a big snake one time
At a program with a guide;
I enjoyed petting the snake
Feeling its muscles move
Beneath the skin
I enjoyed a staring contest
With a deer across the
Yard; actually, we were
Both walking the local
Cemetery and caught, as
If to trap, each other’s eyes
The things—Scripture’s
Creeping things—with tails
Are the ones I seem to
Do best with; I suppose I
Create a cheat out of
Belief and hope that the
Ones with tails and I are
Getting along
Well, what can I say? My
Wish (I don’t think Dale
Evans Rogers would mind)—
Happy tails, happy trails
this work is incited (that is, inspired in
an especially zealous way) in part by a
delightful blog and an extraordinary
group, Three Chatty Cats, celebrating
wondrously the rescue of cats
http://threechattycats.com/2016/02/08/the-odd-cat-sanctuary/
http://threechattycats.com/
Gee, Emoji!
This cat is cool
And a gift from a friend
Who knew my cat, too,
The cat who trained me for
Nineteen years, and I never got
It right
Palindromic name, Hannah
A rescue on Hanover Street
Kitten alone, wandering into
Street traffic
I took her in, and she took
Over
Such a fine companion,
As most cats who are left
In power to train us,
Truly are
The emoji makes me think
Of a cheer—maybe it’s the
Wry smile, maybe the sunshine
Color
Gee, Emoji!
Gee, Gee, emoji!
Gee, emoji, you’re so fine,
Want to paste you all the time!
Graphic cool is what you are,
Any shape, you are a star!
Gee! Emoji!
Gee! Gee! Emoji!
We cheer
For our circular cats,
And we are cheered
my friend who sent me the cat
emoji keeps a Facebook place
called One Mom’s Mission
about the joy in having a child
with Down’s Syndrome; my
general ignorance in using
emojis was first ‘fessed to and
challenged in a friendly way by
Annie at What the Woman Wrote
(sorry, Annie, I still don’t know
how to use these things in
anything like an easy way)
ONE MOM’S MISSION (FB)
https://whatthewomanwrote.wordpress.com/
Cry
Such painful beauty here.
It rains with truthly tear.
The Essence, created by Emily Romano, is a short, structured form of two-lines, six syllables each with an end rhyme and internal rhyme. (From the definition Annie cites.)
https://whatthewomanwrote.wordpress.com/2016/02/08/forlorn/?c=4644#comment-4644
Annie at What the Woman Wrote crafted with this poetic form: her work, “Forlorn.” (The link is just above.) I responded in kind. She, then, kindly shared her expectation that I would post my response in my blog. So I’ve posted, here.
What can I say? She’s influential.
Annie posts wonderful images to complement her written work. I’m not nearly so skillful. So I’m afraid that “here” is going to have to be a reference to anytime in life itself, as can be imagined or recalled. Readers may fill in with a time from your experience. Or take it that mortal life is often this way, when we must, you know, cry.
Ashen Wednesday
(liturgical need)
You have dirt on your
Forehead, the student says
I wanted you to know so you
Don’t walk around all day
That way
But I had just come from
Church (an early mass), and
Wearing the dirt (the ash)
All day would be our routine
If I had to guess, I’d say the
Room is mostly learner-
Populated with evangelicals
With maybe an honest
Agnostic or two,
In which (for all) formal
Understanding, knowing of
Old church practices would
Not be prominent among or
Within
But any church that survives
In turn gains its own
Orthodoxy,
And we spend time after
Noticing the dirt, talking
About spiritual habits plus
Other rituals
My church is trying this,
Someone observes
Yeah, my church, too, another
Notes
And so together in discovery
It appears—newer evangelical,
Independent communities
Reviving treasured actions
Of the first church,
The one ablaze at Pentecost
Reviving in the church is good:
There is great precedence for
That
And for all of us on this new
Day, we find new ways into
(To share outside)
A faithful, ancient season
clcouch123 
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