Pure indolence is challenging for me.
No matter where I am I note a task
inviting some degree of industry,
although nobody is around to ask.
Today I need to rest. I want to bask.
I have no plans, no need to leave my home.
I’ll take a bath and then apply a masque,
but not apply myself, save to this poem.
(Huitain)
I’m paying close attention to my back.
An area was damaged long ago,
and it’s been warning me it might attack
my peace and introduce some pain. I slow
my pace, I bend with care, avoiding wrack
and twinge, but sad to say the winces grow.
Alas – I had three days of feeling fine,
but now I have to nurse a sorry spine.
(Ottava Rima)
Wouldn’t you think it both honest and right,
to repay extension of credit so fast
your lender in future will treat you less tight
and self-esteem flourishes lively and vast?
Wherein is honor if there’s a delay
without explanation or giving good cause?
These are old concepts, and they should convey
a goad to avoidance of ethical flaws.
I won’t assert or blurt, but I’ll record
a temporary state of well in me.
I’m currently unhurt – if I could hoard
this soundness, I would try to brew a tonic –
my cohort then could give me an award
for curing their acute and easing chronic.
But that’s impossible. Life won’t afford
the time or space for such a remedy.
For now I’ll savor vigor soft-restored.
(Magic 9)
Imagining the ocean drawing back,
receding from the shore and pulling sand,
and then reversing in a froth attack
that tumbles pebbles on the briny strand,
is how I think when breathing deep and full.
Inhaling I can sense the ocean’s pull.
My exhalation mimics foam at reach
to push the boundary from sea to beach.
And though the yogi speaks of trough and crest,
for me the thought of ebb and flow works best.
I ran a little errand yesterday –
a morning amble to secure a snack.
Outside the house, on sidewalk, feet away
from driveway, stood a suitcase, handle up
and wheels below, abandoned I would say,
like luggage airports warn us to avoid.
The text was sent last evening – a display
of panic in a neighbor who came back
the night before, from travel to L.A.
(Magic 9)
I stayed up past my normal time last night.
My eyelids didn’t droop, although the book
I started failed to grab me with the right
description, action, concept. I retired
not so tired, turning off the light
and taking half an hour to drift off.
Now I’m surprised my door was left untight,
my phone uncharged, my iPad on. I took
to rest without accustomed oversight.
(Magic 9)
My friend admits she told a lot of lies –
some social, many hiding feeling shame.
She says she’s learned – at 70, she tries
to tell “her truth” to each. I watch her claim
she won’t retreat, now honesty’s her goal.
But sometimes lesson-learners over do.
She tends to preach while tending to her soul,
announcing declarations like they’re new.
I early chose to not misrepresent.
I enter conversation with no mind
to lie. Clear speech is always my intent.
But if my interlocutor’s inclined
to not attend, to flounce or disrespect,
I take that as a license to deflect.
Heralding summer
the blossoms trumpet southward
to the morning light
For years I suffered regular neck pain –
I thought it stemmed from all the office phone.
It seemed that yoga made the ache abstain –
I’ve seldom felt it lately, like the bone
or tendon wasn’t under that old strain.
But working crosswords yesterday, alone,
the ache recurred. Could posture at this table
have torqued my cervical, to pain-enable?
(Ottava Rima)
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