Know, believe
Feel , perceive
These are only starting points,
useless without action.
Guilt, sympathy,
compassion, empathy.
These are only starting points,
Useless without action
Do, change, speak
help, try, seek.
These are actions.
This is where it starts.
#71
The younger you are
the more future you anticipate.
Glory days all waiting in
treasure chests and you hold the key,
like a queen in your garden of dreams.
Some days my head hurts with dreams.
I am overwhelmed by who I might become.
Glory days are forever in a moment
a moment in forever.
The older you get
the more past you accumulate.
Glory days all locked in
individual cells and you hold the key,
like a warden in your prison of memories.
Some days my head hurts with memories.
I am overwhelmed by who I have been.
#70
Fatal moth went flying,
flying through the night,
nightly through the dark,
darkly t’wards the light.
Light pulled like a magnet,
magnetic north, it called,
called the blind to follow,
follow, one and all.
All the moths flew vainly,
vainly t’wards the moon,
mooning for her touch,
touched since the cocoon.
Cocooning through the day,
daily grey moths sleep,
sleep until the moon rise,
rises them to fleet.
Fleet from grey bark nest,
nestled in the brush,
brush dust from their wings
in the frantic rush.
Rush to this new light,
alight on candle’s flame,
flame dancer writhe and fall,
fall and end the game.
#69
This could be the day
when the words run away
and the poetry gets ugly ‘cause
there’s nothing left to say.
So I’ll try to keep it short
and I’ll try to keep it sweet
but I can’t make any promises
I’m not equipped to keep.
I didn’t promise gems
I only promised poems
and sometimes though the lights are on
there’s really no one home.
In the top of my dome.
#68
I’m thinking of a number.
do you know what it is?
A number between make believe and make-up,
between three and twentyone,
between toys and poise.
Sweet petulance
confused enlightenment
contradicting certainty that only wants
to be left alone
at the centre of the Universe.
Do you know the number?
Have you been the number?
Fourteen.
#67
for my sweet, sophisticated fourteen year old granddaughter
Truth isn’t not there because it can’t be seen
anymore than air isn’t not there
because it’s invisible or the world isn’t not there
when our eyes are closed.
Truth is fact not fancy,
proof not pudding.
Truth is hard to find because it hides in plain sight.
Truth echoes in hollow arguments.
Unaltered by focus, rationalization, or cherished outcomes,
truth cannot be bent;
rather, we bend ourselves around the truth, hoping
it will set us free.
#66
When I was bad they sat me in the corner
my back turned to them all
my eyes upon the walls
untill I was recalled.
They didn’t know how interesting I’d find it;
that intersecting line
where cool white planes collide
I lost myself in time.
I was bad and they handed me some chalk
in penance was assigned
to write a hundred times
the measure of my crimes.
They didn’t know how interesting I’d find it;
comparing every line
for cursive curve design
all perfectly aligned.
So if I’m bad and you really want to hurt me
it’s normalcy I dread
where squirrels in my head
have to deal with you instead.
#65
Dear Universe,
I have a few things I’d like to discuss with you…
1. At what point did it seem like a good idea to sabotage my knees so any attempt at a regular exercise regime was doomed to failure?
2. When did you decide to relocate the hair from the top of my husband’s head to my chin?
3. This law of gravity thing, I pride myself on being law abiding, but I really think that some things should be exempt; at least two that I can think of offhand.
4. I’m pretty sure you knew I was going to live this long so why arrange things so the warrantees expire just when I was getting the hang of it?
In short, Universe, I don’t particularly enjoy your sense of humour but in the absence of any other Universes to choose from, you seem to have a mortal lock on the monopoly. So, I will continue to inhabit you but only under duress.
Sincerely
The Writer at the Bottom of the Well
“This is an automated out of office reply. Thank you for your letter to the Universe. I will be on vacation and away from the office for the next millennia. Your message is important to us and will be answered, in the order in which it was received, as soon as I return. Thank you”
#64
I need to be that other me for a while, the me who smiles wide and thinks large and stands in the middle of the page, not in the margin. The me who dusts off yesterday’s remains then calls the rains to wash it away and yet I won’t get wet unless I want to, I just walk away, no, the rain can’t touch me unless I say so. That other me is free to think unconventionally, painting my world with thoughts curled around dreams hurled at walls where they spread and glow and pulse and show the way to be this me permanently. I need to be that other me.
#66
The thing about a circle is it never ends
but it always ends up where it started.
So maybe this ‘circle of life’
lionized by Disney is just a series
of bends in the road; the drunken,
accidental extra steps to the right
in the long journey that pulls us
back the spot where the plane
crashed in the desert.
The thing about a spiral is it ends
in a different place
than it begins yet it still wends
its way like a circle, minus the futility.
Spirals nest and dance
where circles are solitary,
can only join with others if they’re
broken and twisted first like
rings in chain maille.
The thing is
I’d rather be a part of a spiral of life
and dance and nest with you for a while
Than spin forever in a solitary circle.
#62
Linda Studley 