Autumn was written in October 2013 for a poetry reading I was unable to attend. Transitions began then but ended today.
Autumn poems
It's getting dark earlier. The leaves have begun changing colors. Some have begun to fall. And I'm wondering if I'll get to fall,too. Not the hurting kind of falling...the loving kind.
The letting myself go and letting him know he's always on my mind and in me I think he'd find the soft hugs, long kisses, saying goodbye and noticing its morning kind of love...
I'm talking about the where in the world did the time go bc it was just 10 and we were hugging good night and now dawn is here and we've gotta go to work with no sleep to just repeat it tomorrow kind...
The getting in the car with no real destination but to just ride and enjoy the changing colors and discuss the changing stages in our love as we grow from talking about events for next weekend to planning our vacation next year kind
Transitions
And so the green becomes yellow and changes to brown.
Then, the leaf falls.
The sugar is gone and it seems like our love is leaving, too.
We start to drift away from the love we'd founded.
Nightly visits, interrupted by the whirling winds of responsibility, become calls with visits every 2 or 3 days.
Without the intimacy in which our love thrived, questions arise.
I wonder: Was he just another fabrication of the one God promised?
You ask: Was she the one I was meant to find?
We fall into silence when we should be speaking most and as the passionate love drains more...
We fall into winter which can easily seem like death; but, beneath the colorless-ness is new love....
We fall into that buds from the intimacy that was planted in passion but is now nourished by the reality that our questions have been answered.
You are not a love I created in my mind.
I am the one you were sent to find.
We grow into a summer of passion, made stronger by the seasons of our love.
Monday, May 26, 2014
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Quickwrite: There's A Place...
Surrounded by 3&1/2 mauve, wall-like structures. I sit at the Dell keyboard and complete today's task. The screen at which I gaze is flat and stands upon a beige, speckled, desk-like surface attached to 2 of the "walls." Joining my virtual page on this surface are many different items I either need or should discard: mounds of papers from years of assigned tasks; organizers containing pencils, stickies, tape, scissors, markers, and more; outdated pictures of the two for whom I come to this desk each day; videotapes memorializing an initiative, reclaimed from someone's trash in hopes they'll be needed again; Mrs. Dash to flavor occasionally meals I bring; a mug for coffee rarely brewed; my purse, work bag, iPhone...
My thoughts begin the litany of reprimands I daily pile upon myself for continuing to exist this way in this space. Before I can go too far down the slippery slope to Why-Am-I-Still-Here-Ville, my internal conversation is interrupted by sound a couple cubicles behind me. Tuning in, I hear the secretary question my colleague to respond to a caller's request. Another colleague sneezes to my rear left, and 2 versions of blessings are called over other "walls."
As my brain, thirsty for some problem to delve into, begins looking for the files containing everything about the rituals surrounding sneezing, a message interrupts it's effortless flow. The vent diagonally above me is blowing a little more than my bare forearms appreciate. The hands at each end are growing cold; but, a glance down confirms thoughts that the nails aren't blue...yet. I wonder if the extra effort of lifting my nails higher than normal creates enough energy to prevent my fingers from growing too cold; my fingertips barely touch the keys due to my nail-length.
While I ponder the naked growths and edge close to a mild verbal pop for not taking the time to polish any of my exposed nails, I feel the beginning pangs of hunger. No odors have instigated this physical response. I haven't eaten since yesterday and need to refill. Not too much, though. Why take in more energy than I'll expend sitting here, entombed in this office-like structure?
My thoughts begin the litany of reprimands I daily pile upon myself for continuing to exist this way in this space. Before I can go too far down the slippery slope to Why-Am-I-Still-Here-Ville, my internal conversation is interrupted by sound a couple cubicles behind me. Tuning in, I hear the secretary question my colleague to respond to a caller's request. Another colleague sneezes to my rear left, and 2 versions of blessings are called over other "walls."
As my brain, thirsty for some problem to delve into, begins looking for the files containing everything about the rituals surrounding sneezing, a message interrupts it's effortless flow. The vent diagonally above me is blowing a little more than my bare forearms appreciate. The hands at each end are growing cold; but, a glance down confirms thoughts that the nails aren't blue...yet. I wonder if the extra effort of lifting my nails higher than normal creates enough energy to prevent my fingers from growing too cold; my fingertips barely touch the keys due to my nail-length.
While I ponder the naked growths and edge close to a mild verbal pop for not taking the time to polish any of my exposed nails, I feel the beginning pangs of hunger. No odors have instigated this physical response. I haven't eaten since yesterday and need to refill. Not too much, though. Why take in more energy than I'll expend sitting here, entombed in this office-like structure?
Monday, June 4, 2012
Ma Weeze's Kitchen
Picture it, Jersey City, 1976. (Yeah, I'm a typical product of the tele-sthized generation.) Looking back it couldn't have been more than 8'X10'. Even as a preschooler, I knew it was small. Ironically, I can't recall feeling hugely special anywhere other than that room - Ma Weeze's kitchen, where love was poured into me like sweet, rich hot chocolate on a bitterly cold winter day. Ceramic and metal pots and pans were tools used there to create edible tokens of love for me.
Ma Weeze, or my great-grandmother Louise, was my caregiver before I entered formal schooling. Under her skillful manipulation, dough would form into perfect texture, becoming clean circles with the aid of her deftly wielded drinking glass. Cooked to a golden brown and plated with syrup made by someone's aunt, the biscuits yielded every ounce of their buttery goodness to my waiting taste buds and warmed my belly in a manner only done at home.
Concomitant to the filling of my belly was the filling of my heart. Under Ma Weeze's adept execution of her love recipe, my world-worn tank would reach capacity, becoming symmetric and whole with the aid of her soft caresses and honey-coated words. Satiated to capacity and edified with wisdom made by decades of nurturing, my heart thrived under her care and elevated me from peon to princess in a manner only accomplished when the sole recipient of concentrated love.
Ma Weeze, or my great-grandmother Louise, was my caregiver before I entered formal schooling. Under her skillful manipulation, dough would form into perfect texture, becoming clean circles with the aid of her deftly wielded drinking glass. Cooked to a golden brown and plated with syrup made by someone's aunt, the biscuits yielded every ounce of their buttery goodness to my waiting taste buds and warmed my belly in a manner only done at home.
Concomitant to the filling of my belly was the filling of my heart. Under Ma Weeze's adept execution of her love recipe, my world-worn tank would reach capacity, becoming symmetric and whole with the aid of her soft caresses and honey-coated words. Satiated to capacity and edified with wisdom made by decades of nurturing, my heart thrived under her care and elevated me from peon to princess in a manner only accomplished when the sole recipient of concentrated love.
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Full Circle
Tomorrow became a week. A week became a month. A month became two. Two months became tonight.
Tonight, I type and realize the end is about to connect with the beginning. Again, as I've done too many nights before, I resolve...tomorrow.
Tonight, I type and realize the end is about to connect with the beginning. Again, as I've done too many nights before, I resolve...tomorrow.
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Thoughts on What's Trending Now
There are some quotes, statements, links or photos posted that just give me cause to pause. The Coretta Scott King funeral photo posted alongside the photo of Michelle Obama - one of those. Note the former pic memorializes a grieving WIDOW; although I understand the desire to view the Kings as the Black community's 1st family and thereby pair the two wives, each with her daughter laying on her lap, there is a message that is disturbing. With scriptures being ignorantly shared that wished curses upon the president a true Christian should never wish on her/his enemy...we've got to be more critical about the messages we relay. Find another pose. I'm sure there's one. Post that.
My more recent cause to pause...the photo of Emmett Till paired with that of Trayvon Martin. (DISCLAIMOR: BOTH OF THEIR MURDERS WERE SENSELESS SO PLEASE DON'T INTERPRET WHAT FOLLOWS AS A JUSTIFICATION OF EITHER.)
The posting of this sends a message of acceptance of the idea that wearing a hoodie in today's south (or wherever if you listen to the commentary) equates with whistling at a White woman in the south of the '50s. T'ain't necessarily so, folks. The latter was a violation of a widely known societal more. Whether or not a young visitor from the north knew that unwritten rule both existed and could cost him his life, Black men and women from the south were too aware and ensured their sons understood the behavioral expectations to prevent their being lynched.
To date, although Geraldo's media-seeking tweets and others justifications have implied wearing a hoodie while Black is a no-no, there has been NO unwritten rule about so doing that the masses of any community have communicated to their children. That being the case, Trayvon was not a naive young man in a foreign land unaware that he was violating a social norm by wearing a hoodie. There was nothing other than the perceived disparity between his race and location that made him a target.
To conclude this hastily written missive, a wife doesn't equal a widow and a teen murdered for unknowingly violating a more doesn't equate to a teen murdered just for being thought the wrong human in a given place. We just can't post messages that can be used to support agendas that are diametrically opposed to our intent and need to be a little more critical.
My more recent cause to pause...the photo of Emmett Till paired with that of Trayvon Martin. (DISCLAIMOR: BOTH OF THEIR MURDERS WERE SENSELESS SO PLEASE DON'T INTERPRET WHAT FOLLOWS AS A JUSTIFICATION OF EITHER.)
The posting of this sends a message of acceptance of the idea that wearing a hoodie in today's south (or wherever if you listen to the commentary) equates with whistling at a White woman in the south of the '50s. T'ain't necessarily so, folks. The latter was a violation of a widely known societal more. Whether or not a young visitor from the north knew that unwritten rule both existed and could cost him his life, Black men and women from the south were too aware and ensured their sons understood the behavioral expectations to prevent their being lynched.
To date, although Geraldo's media-seeking tweets and others justifications have implied wearing a hoodie while Black is a no-no, there has been NO unwritten rule about so doing that the masses of any community have communicated to their children. That being the case, Trayvon was not a naive young man in a foreign land unaware that he was violating a social norm by wearing a hoodie. There was nothing other than the perceived disparity between his race and location that made him a target.
To conclude this hastily written missive, a wife doesn't equal a widow and a teen murdered for unknowingly violating a more doesn't equate to a teen murdered just for being thought the wrong human in a given place. We just can't post messages that can be used to support agendas that are diametrically opposed to our intent and need to be a little more critical.
Friday, January 6, 2012
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