(x = space)
x
x
Eleventy-‘Leven
x
It’s a child’s number
Like the child who grows up
And goes to war
Survives
There are scars
x
To talk about the war is a sin
Sometimes there are vows
Mostly, it’s harrowing
To say
x
Harrowing
To remember
Better to enjoy
Softer textures after
x
But it won’t go away, remembrance
So say something
Like an order
Do it now
x
C L Couch
x
Photo by sydney Rae on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
Thirty Means End of Story
x
How will it end
We do not know
What happens next
We have great lore
And supposition
We have stories
Of returns
We should believe them
x
C L Couch
x
(not years—thirty is or used to be a sign in journalism)
x
x
Photo by Rishabh Sharma on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
spooky times
x
have a good hallowe’en
be safe
no razor blades
did that ever happen
not to invoke a retry
of insanity
nothing to do
with trick-or-treat magic
costumes for the veil
that entertain
the fun kind of fear
civil ghosts
good witches who
spell out
in autumn
south in spring
in chocolate letters
marshmallow punctuation
masks
ephemeral disguise
‘til it’s time to treat
x
c l couch
x
x
Four pumpkins, individually carved for Halloween 2020. One with a COVID mask.
(detail)
photo by the blowup on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
For All Souls
x
Soon
And very soon
It will be time for
Remembering
The dead
Los Díos de los Muertos when
Graveyards light with
Stunning light in
Some places,
Other places
Less so
For remembrance
x
There will be candy
Other foods
Meals shared beside
The stones
It is Latino
Latin-x
Other groups have other ways
Of memory
x
For some, this becomes
A party
Like a wake
For others, city-wide
Express or digress
There will be something
It is for
Everyone
Para todos
x
To Latin-x
The community
In thanks
The ones who inspire
A lighted way
For shadows,
A way to catch our tears
But for love
In remembering
x
C L Couch
x
x
Sugar skulls before decoration.
[image b]y Jonathunder – Own work, GFDL 1.2, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=63912646
x
(sorry, I add a hyphen to Latin as a help in my pronouncing)
x
(x = space)
x
x
Look Now
x
I pulled on the window shade
The old-fashioned kind
I got stuck with
Gray all around
I suspect another strange fall day
Too hot in the eastern USA
This year
x
It takes a couple tugs
But without the absurd length
That it can get to,
The shade goes up
And it might be too hot
But the leaves that look at me
Inches from the glass
Are autumn first
Colors mixed with summer green
Red and orange, yellow
All say hi
(green sighs)
We are here
x
It is the season, anyway
And I am thankful
Whose formality comes
Later on
With cornucopia
Thick tablecloths
And such
x
And while there is no peace
There is small, sustaining
Joy
In nature’s
Hello in the season
Outside
x
C L Couch
x
x
Photo by eberhard 🖐 grossgasteiger on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
National Hispanic Heritage Month
(in the USA, E.E.U.U.)
x
It is
Spanish-American
Heritage Month
Smartly set
From mid-September
To mid-October
I probably should not
Off a tribute
With my schoolroom
Spanish
x
Colors
Movement
Music
Dance
These are what we know
The heart
The heritage
We must learn
The Anglos
And the rest
All our lives
Would be so much better
x
We need them here,
The Latinx
I don’t know what this
Says about
Borders
Except that they
Be porous
As I once experienced
When living in
California
Chula Vista
And took the bus
For fifty cents
To Mexico
x
And drove into
The northern countryside
Toward Tecate
On other occasions
Buying tile for work
And bread
Dosed with sugar
Bread of many colors
That had to be eaten
In the day
After purchase from
The panadería
x
And in the town
South of mine
Where I live now
Stores with Spanish signs
Because it’s where
The migrant
Workers and their families
Shop
And there are signs
For churches,
Too
A life I am not close to
Though in its own
In their own
It is full
x
I think I might
Be welcomed
Should I walk inside
Even with
My schoolroom Spanish
Pero
No sé exactamente
x
C L Couch
x
x
Snapped this photo of my cousin while hiking in Colorado.
Photo by Sarah Cervantes on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
The Dead and the Quick
(9/11)
x
It is a day we lived
Through,
Those who lived
x
Like D-Day
Like Hastings
For the English
Or the entry of the Nazis
Into Paris
For the French
Like the storms in Indonesia
That killed thousands
In 2004
Like the killing
Of a good man
In Haiti
Recently
Wrecking the nation
For a time
Upon hurricane
And earthquake
x
They are history
Beyond the idiom
And by those now gone
We rebuild and build
And sometimes pledge
Anew or new
We will take greater care
Cosmic care
Next time
x
We might learn
If we should learn something
From allegories that were
Flesh and bone
And blood
Except that being found
Is good
Being remembered
Parochially,
Sometimes globally
x
Forever with a double
Meaning,
9-1-1
How peaceful to be by
The memorials
A quiet place to count
And then to cry the names
Peacefully
x
This place
These places
Are all over
Hopes we might be united
Everywhere
For once
An hour and a day
And then for keeps
For keeping
All the Earth
And us
For longer
So much longer than
The bugled ceremony’s
Time
x
C L Couch
x
(9/11/21, 11/9/21)
x
9/11 photographs exhibition at photography festival Rencontres Arles 2019
Photo by Fred Moon on Unsplash
x
(x = space)
x
x
“Remembering Lorraine Bay”
x
Newspaper headline
Human interest story
She was interesting
Loved her job
(with challenges)
As a flight attendant
x
She was on the flight
The plane that crashed
Near a small town in
Western Pennsylvania
x
C L Couch
x
x
Shanksville’s Main Street in July 2006
By Aude – Own work, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1007438
x
(x = space)
x
x
Sunday Best
(for Juneteenth)
x
I celebrate from a distance,
Thinking of church
As an invitation
I received
Several years ago
In a Black church in Louisville,
Kentucky
x
I was there for meetings
And on
Sunday morning
We went to a church
Some of us
Had known about
x
Arms rose into the air
For hours, and the choir
Never seemed
To stop
x
And, I’m sorry,
I don’t remember the
Preaching
But remember the music
And the dancing in the air
Of arms and words
Carried up
By song
x
And if the Spirit could be
Smoke, we
We wouldn’t breathe
But as it’s air
We breathed in life
And exhaled
New visions
x
And we were welcomed,
Such was love
In the airy cloud
That prismed every color
With invitation
Courtesy
And movement
For outsiders
x
We were there for hours
Without knowing
This was Sunday best
At its best
I’ll be a part of it again
Someday
x
For there
There was freedom in the
Spirit
As there should be a day for it
Then every day
Every day a work
And play
For freedom
Numinous
And real
x
C L Couch
x
x
Spirituality
Photo by Thiago Barletta on Unsplash
x
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