I’m pleased to read a message from the man
who comes when he has time and when I need
some garden help. I tend it as I can,
but lack the tools and heart to prune and weed
as much as necessary. Bushes seed
abundantly – the problem’s positive –
but he’s so busy now I’ve had to plead.
Tomorrow he has time and drive to give.
I’ve modified behavior once or twice,
and learned some lessons doing so, for sure.
When I eliminate a type of vice
I have to do refusing daily. Cure
that’s positive, adopting something nice,
requires that I start it small, endure,
and then let doing it supply the power.
I fail if I impose, at first, one hour.
A dream remembered after I’m awake
a couple hours, had me with someone
as I prepare a very simple cake
that, in the oven right before it’s done,
I realize lacks a needed fat. I’d spun
the mix too rapidly, and left a part
behind. Although it’s edible and fun,
reluctantly I know I must restart.
I woke up with a line of poetry
resounding, and I failed to jot it down.
I opted not to flip the switch at 3,
and light the room and make my pupils shrink.
Repeating it while sinking back, to see
the next two hours of my dreamy rest,
I rose at half-past 5 with memory
erased. I’m sure it ended with a noun,
and that vignette is now a theme for me.
I met the man when I was seventeen.
We argued while our magnetism drew
togetherward, and built some thing between
us we called love that neither shrank nor grew.
In age three seasons older, he had few
ideas but cleaved to them. His passing strange
attracted me and bored me, that is true.
I didn’t know obsession would derange.
So chilly here this morning, though it’s June,
I fire up the fireplace. I know
it will be warm inside this afternoon,
but want to practice yoga now – the flow
and pose and breath will make this body go
more flexibly, and lubricate my mind
as well as tendons. Standing in the glow
of flame, hot yoga here is my own kind.
I’m still digesting lunch from yesterday.
This processing is not about the food.
I spent the time exposed to a display
of fundamental blinded attitude.
The stories heard served only to convey
restricted sight and plot ineptitude.
I marveled what was then is still what is,
relieved I never linked my life to his.
Of late I find it’s easier to walk
a little longer not desiring rest.
I say it here, cause I don’t want to talk
to friends unless I hear sincere request.
To speak about my health there’s no behest,
but I’ll record a hint I’m doing well.
Is stamina resulting from the vest?
That makes some sense, but it’s too soon to tell.
It’s odd how often people I know well
describe and criticize peculiar traits
they find in others, which they’d like to quell,
but miss the obvious that implicates.
The selfsame qualities which in them dwell
enable recognition. Wisdom waits,
and I’ll bet I don’t have immunity.
I’ll concentrate that criti-scope on me.
Loquacious as a child and a teen,
and even in her 20’s, more than less,
she spoke her mind, aloud, and didn’t mean
offense, but also wouldn’t self-suppress.
She learned some modulation as she aged,
externally at least, and grew to know
how bootless is a war of words that’s waged
without celebrity, without a show.
By 60, she disdained futility –
she listened more – if anyone could learn,
she thought it might be self, and silently
she tried to comprehend more, and discern.
A decade later, with her years indulged,
she thinks her odd ideas might be divulged.
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