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The Fragility of Things

So many things in life are fragile:

nerves, eggshells, that set of Lladro figures needlepointing on

your great aunt’s mantlepiece. And family. Family, especially. I never realized

how much until mine began breaking. Tiny fault lines appearing on the faces of my parents,

aunts, uncles, myself. Small fissures at the hinges of mouths, the chalked, blue circumference

‘round eyes. From there – like Ozymandias – it all crumbles. Two thus far, have tumbled to the ground, with more to follow. Cracks in the foundation of the family tree, ever-widening, threatening the

center of the two grand titans of my youth I visited this week. They struggle against the fell.

One, gnarled roots lichened with dry rot, incapable of withstanding the gentlest breeze,

leans on the trunk of the other, stoic and strong, but tired. Oh-so tired. The detritus

of decline feathers their nest, clutter collecting on surfaces

like whiskers on unshaved faces, the efforts required to

clean, to clear, too much. Kleenex, coffee, yogurt

cups, cardboard

and pill boxes,

a cacophony of

alarms sounding

and resounding,

hour after hour,

chiming birdcall

begging a berry be

dropped

in a gullet,

infinitesimal

directional

notches

scored,

minutes

sliced, drop by

drop wedged

between

here and gone.

Soon and not long –

a blood-dimmed axe will fall, or tide will rise and uproot more fragile things in life, like nerves, eggshell, porcelain, and titans, strong and ancient and mortal as family

especially family.

December 9, 2023 0

Mamaw facetimed me yesterday afternoon, via my youngest daughter. Her voice twanged hard through the screen. But then, it’s always twanged hard. On a plane once, someone asked if she hailed from Australia. But it’s Appalachia that’s made her, stamped her with the crags that line her face, the hair that curls like the eponymous gray smoke off her mountains.

She loves those mountains and everything that flows and grows from them:

She loves a good muddy creek and the fish that swim there. Give her a worm and a hook and she’ll perch on the bank for hours, casting and rocking and listening to birds.

Oh, how she loves birds. All around her house, feeders saddle porch rails, hang from soffits, suction to windows so she can watch finches sling birdseed like laughter, hummingbirds spin air to blurred magic.

She loves a vegetable patch full of pole beans and cabbage and maters. She cooks fresh in the summer, then her own canned all year round. You’ll always find a pot of pintos on the stovetop and a hodgepodge of sides on the table. Drop in any time of day and she’s ready to feed you – or sit you down for a game of spoons. She loves a good game of cards.

But she especially loves BINGO. One of the first times I met her was in a Moose Lodge with a bingo cage rattling and a slew of daubers at the ready. She slid a card and dauber my way and told me to play.

But even more than BINGO, she loves babies. Hand her a newborn and the lines in her face vanish, the twang in her voice softens, and she’ll coo, “Good… Good… Good…” for hours on end — the only person I’ve ever heard do this. I’m convinced that’s why my girls have both turned out so very good, good, good.

And most of all, she loves family. And whomever she loves becomes family for life. I ought to know.

Because even though we aren’t technically, legally family anymore. she called me yesterday from her hospital bed to tell me she loves me, the rest of her family gathered tight like quilt squares bunched warm round her heart. Because last night, she gave us all a good scare.

Last night, she went to see Jesus. She told me so this morning when she called me yet again — to tell me she loves me and to tell me she saw Jesus, and her mama and daddy too. Her daddy was running, and her mama was singing, and she wanted so badly to stay. But Jesus told her to go back home, to go tell it on the mountain. And so she did. And so she is.

Mamaw was my mother-in-law for almost twenty years. But she’s my family forever. Our lives are stitched together not just through my girls, her granddaughters, but through that boundless, timeless love of hers. Sweet as birdsong. Binding as pintos. Eternal as Jesus.

November 19, 2023 0

Hardwood Hangover

The rain falls, cold marble tears

shredding the gold and cinnamon

feathered boas the trees put on for

their final party of the year.

They hadn’t been in a festive mood,

not at first — a long summer of heated

exchanges and dry spells left them

feeling used and abused by the powers

that be.

But in the eleventh hour they

donned their finery and showed up,

showed out, took to the streets to

drink the wine of the winding year,

sing the festival songs, clap shoulders,

slap asses, get rowdy.

And now it’s morning, and they’re a motley

band of sloppy drunks, saggy and hungover,

shivering with shame, leaning on one another

in the cold light of day,

wondering what, how, why they did

what they did on the front lawn last night,

the residue of bad decisions scattered in

sodden chunks at their feet.

November 12, 2023 0

Tired of Lockdowns

’m really tired of lockdowns.
I’m tired of hearing we’re in Code Red and to assume the position.
I’m tired of pulling students I may or may not know into my classroom.
I’m tired of ushering them into a dark corner to hunker down.
I’m tired of hearing my voice shake as I tell them to be quiet and take it seriously.
I’m tired of watching them choose their coping mechanism this time around: tears, frustration, nonchalance, humor.
I’m tired of telling them to put away their phones.
I’m tired of making them sit, uncomfortable and uncertain, for hours.
I’m tired of watching them squirm because they have to pee.
I’m tired of me squirming because I have to pee.
I’m tired of girls bleeding through their tampons because they can’t go to the bathroom.
And I’m tired of being grateful that someone didn’t bleed out from something far worse.
I’m tired of squad cars pulling fast and furious into our parking lots.
I’m tired of SWAT teams running armed and aggressive inside our halls.
And I’m tired of being ever-so-grateful that they were here.
I’m tired of hoaxes and crank calls.
And I’m tired of being grateful it was “just a hoax.”
I’m tired. My students are tired.
We’re okay.
And we understand that just being tired after a lockdown is a luxury many haven’t had.
But that doesn’t make it okay.
This has got to stop.

October 16, 2023 0

Juicy Fruit

(In honor and love of Jimmy Buffet)

My grandmother would mail me

a single stick of Juicy Fruit,

wrapped in its dustcover and

a birthday card, until I was ten.

Life like a tire swing, round and firm,

my arms wrapped tight, legs pumping,

toes stretched to touch the falling sun

the color of mangos above the

honeysuckle vine, nearly a whole

state up from Pascagoula,

where a man once busted his flip flop

and made a song about it —

though I preferred going barefoot

with my bathing suit and

Juicy Fruit.

Then we moved

a whole state over,

to a life packed and stacked

with stale air and skies scraped

by steel beams and glass,

where I grew older and straight up —

a tall, prickly weed wrapped in

concrete and trapped in the gilded

pages of my Daddy’s holy bible,

the canon thundering, me perpetually

blundering, the preacher men plundering

all the lost souls.

While the Pascagoula man sang of

lost shakers of salt,

They preached on lost pillars of salt

in Gomorrah, the trickster Delilah,

the wickedness of Eve,

how there’s always a woman

to blame,

but the man from Pascagoula

sang it’s his own damn fault.

And I believed him.

Breathed in, breathed out,

asked questions,

and found myself a rebel

two states east of Eden,

stomped on and stained dark

and wrapped up in the wages of sin.

I licked my wounds and searched

for the answers to questions that

bothered them so.

Through fifty-plus years

of perpetual caution

I’ve learned how to feel who I am,

make profit of price,

blend scarlet and spice,

till I filled my tin cup to the brim

with red wine and roses,

with strength and fine daughters,

with full-bodied, complex

self-love. I’ve now added sons

and a broad-shouldered harbor

to the glorious song of myself.

Smoky and tart, I pour from the heart

the tunes I’ve collected in here.

Chapter and verse, blessings and curse,

some tragic, most magic,

while the man from Pascagoula

passed on

his lyrics and lifestyle. The pied-piper of escapism lead me free of all shame,

so today I celebrate juicy fruit,

the falling mango sun,

the calcified shell of sin

I sling out past the honeysuckle vine

and an old busted flip flop,

and rejoice that shells sink, hope floats

that life is like a tire swing, and

that true legends never die.

October 8, 2023 0

Stacked Beauty

want

to write

words

stacked with

beauty like

magnets

or rock cairns

attracting and

guiding readers to

breathtaking views

of tangerine skies

sea glass windows

into cliffsides

cranberry bogs

lavender fields mercurial

storm-swept sea beds

to find coral and almonds

the mottled man in the moon

drink twilight smoke

cloud wisp bite

bourbon and

shoulders

hear stars click on

feel fireflies sext

in the gloaming

wings beating in wild

persimmon percussion

hearts lit limoncello bulbs

see me and see me

and see me please be seen

August 7, 2023 0

Brain-Eating Amoeba in the Headlines

I want to write poems to daybreak, to the light as it’s filtered through trees,

to birdcalls, to blossoms, cicadas in song, to the buzzing and flitting of bees.

But life yanks me back to the dark side, where beastly thoughts eat up my brain,

in headlines of kidnapping hoaxes, of killers, the war in Ukraine,

oceans with sea beds like hot tubs, inflation and costs on the run,

the subterfuge sins of past leaders and the kinks of this president’s son.

Yes, I want to write about nature, how it nurtures and soothes me, but then

the nature of mankind does neither; it warps, and it tortures and bends,

turns beautiful thoughts into ugly, twists empathy into a crime,

defiling all reason, just questions remain, without any reason or rhyme

like:

Why books can be banned, but then no, never guns.

Why it’s wrong to say gay, but not thug.

Why artificial intelligence gets exalted and praised,

yet fake news! is called out every day.

Why skills learned in slavery matter – the hell? —

but black lives and their stories just don’t.

Why pro-life laws ratchet up tighter than tight,

While child labor laws come all sorts of undone.

Why tiktok trends show us societal truths;

Climate change and vaccines they’re all lies.

Why celebrity weddings, divorces, and deaths

mean more to our lives than our own.

Why a Barbie doll’s life in a movie’s too woke,

but real women’s rights are too wrong,

And domestic dark ages are special and sacred,

and for better and worse, they’re just right.

Why it’s okay to cancel a beer and trans girl,

but never a good ole boy’s song.

And why you can’t pull a gun on a liquor store clerk

but you can on school kids when you’re in a small town.

Our minds are sickened and damaged, consumed

In the brain-eating amoeba we read

Like the kind that killed this week’s Georgia man–

still, quite rare, they assure, they’re agreed.

Why of course, then, and okay, for sure.

July 29, 2023 0

Summertime — suck it up, buttercup — for tomorrow, it ends

There’s a reason I hunker down on my porch in the summer – the only season of quiet that exists in my life.

Through June and July, I sip at the slow, sultry, syrup of summer like an addict, soaking my marrow in its sweetness, doing my best to bottle it in memory so I’m sustained when it’s gone — which happens tomorrow.

Tomorrow, summer leaves me.

And I pray there’s enough liquor of peace in my core to help me remember that it won’t always be like it’s about to be —

where time (and I) will take a beating:

a brutal, full-on assault of seconds bruising and buckling into

minutes, bleeding into pulpy, pulverized

hours, shredding to hard, dusty

days, bled dry into

months completely exsanguinated, drought-fed, and strung out like jerky, tough and leathery and jerking me around, seeming without end.

And tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow spins out in its frenzied pace of work and

acting class and

football practice

followed by homework somehow and then

work again and lesson plans and

voice lessons and

football and

homework somehow somewhere and — I forgot about dinner! and

again work and lesson plans and teaching and

piano lessons this time and

football and homework where? when does it get done? and dinner how? and

here’s work once more and lesson plans and teaching and

Wednesday afternoon laundry and help me Jesus! homework and maybe dinner for real, a table and everything and

dance class and

football and maybe homework and maybe snacks instead of dinner and – showers dang it! we can’t forget showers – and

God help me, I’m going under and I forgot all about grading and feedback and

now it’s time for the Friday Night Lights that stretch and twist and warp like an elastic band thinner and thinner until they catapult us finally into

Saturday and more football and laundry, and

hair appointments maybe? and grocery shopping somehow? and selfcare, is that even a thing? HA! and

… and Sunday, bless-ed, blesss-ed Sunday – breathe in, breathe out on thank God for recovery Sunday, but

no husband, no daddy, no real time with just us at all and then, oh God! here we go again and

rinse and repeat and rinse and repeat and rinse and repeat, ad nauseum.

And tomorrow, it begins.

I’m scared y’all. This year, I’m really, so very afraid that I’m not ready.

So here I sit on my porch shot-gunning as much of the final sweet seconds of summer as I possibly can. And trying my best not to panic and and and andandandandandandandand…GULP!

I don’t think it’s working.

July 25, 2023 0

The Song of a Mother

My son swims in jell-o-bright water,

a nine-year-old Achilles dripping blueberry syrup

from sanctified limbs.

Fluid and free to flip his hair, sashay his tail,

he bobs along, suspended in color-soaked dreams.

Sweet honeyed daylight dapples his skin in flashes

and splashes like sequins (not chainmail) like scales

jazzed

and

pentatonic

daring swift-footed heroes to dance and sing

eat peaches or figs

whatever they like.

He’s not like most boys. I know this.

And he knows this too. And because he’s not,

monsters lurk in his idyll.

Charybdis and Scylla cast shadow and stone in his bright jell-o water,

stretch tentacle to tendon, would cleave him in two:

half oil-slicked wreckage half solar eclipse

Claim he’s the monster here –

not dazzling and daring,

but different and dangerous,

contagious, blasphemous,

wrong.

A sinister sign of the times.

I pray he sees the truth – how sinister and wrong they are;

masquerading their message of love

that’s not love.

Love is celebrating your bold, burnished child

(any child, every child)

and love is providing the armor

(why must it always be armor?)

to help your child live out his love

(any love, every love).

Not the love you would prefer he live –

a love dipped in non-Styx Teflon,

safe and colorless, sealing him in tradition because:

it’s easier (not because you believe it’s the right way);

it’s smooth (not because it’s straight);

you love him (not because love is love is love is love).

But love IS love is oh-so glorious and personal and… love.

So, you do love him

and affirm him. Tell him he is alright.

That who he is, is not wrong.

Or I do. Not you…

You wrong and hurt him.

Tell him he is too colorful. With too much sashay.

A boy’s light should glint with steel, not sparkle with glitter,

be myrmidon dark, not technicolor twinkle.

Should be sharp, uncompromising, heroic, brave.

To be otherwise is unwise.

Like some problem to solve correctly.

A choice on some standardized test.

Answer A or B.

There is no C. You were born how you were born. You have no choice.

At least on that we can agree—

I mean, would anyone choose something as hard as this?

in a world that hates heroes so flush and plush with sparkle?

then again, if we could — why would anyone not choose sweetness and light?

not want to live somewhere beyond bedeviled and bewildered?

beyond haunted or hardened?

somewhere

weightless and fluid and free,

my son

floats in jell o bright water,

a nine- year-old Achilles

dripping blueberry syrup

from sanctified limbs.

July 18, 2023 0

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Multigenerational Mom Muses on Twin Toddlers & Twenty-Something Daughters

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