Pop

Every morning I wake up and take my pills and go outside to my garden and drink my coffee, do a little yoga, meditate. medicate. Lately I have been thinking about my Dad, who passed into the void on August 2nd, all of 80 years old. I have been seeing him all over the place, and unable to shake the feeling of sadness. On days where I'm not taking care of my mother, I am moping around, somewhere between her house and my house. Unable to move forward, unable to shrink backward, unable to just be.

Part of it has to do with the fact that I promised him I would write him his eulogy. He asked me and of course I said yes. When it came down to it I was unable to put the words on paper. There was so much to say about him but it was almost as if writing it would make it real. I walked around that day, the day of the funa-real with three different version, but couldn't do it. Maybe next time.

I loved my Dad so much, that I can't imagine him not being here. I like to go into his chair and feel him, his arms around me. He told me he would miss me. He has no idea how much I will miss him. And do.

The last few mornings for some reason the pain in my head is abhorant. (is that a word or did I just make it up?)Like now. I haven't been writing very much. My dad wanted me to write a book. He didn't really understand my poetry, although he did like the poem "Geese Clouds" very much. He thought it was about a husband and wife, which was quite intuitive...though it was about me and my dog. Same thing. It was chosen to be part of a collection of poems that were picked for the Austin International Poetry Festival a few years back. He was proud of everything I did. Although I'm sure I disappointed him from time to time, he made me feel like the prettiest girl at the dance, or the most popular girl in the class, even if I never really was. I'm single now, no husband after twenty years, no boyfriend..of my choosing I like to believe. But no matter what, my Dad was my guy, handsome, talented, funny, kind, sweet, a hard-ass, and a hipster. He's a hard act to follow.


Geese Clouds

Those are Geese Clouds, she explained to him,
The kind of milky clouds that attract geese in the winter,
You know, when it's gray and it gets cold out, like
in December the time of year when the geese should
be gone but they're confused because winter is slow
coming in New York, but slow going as well.
So the geese clouds lure the confused geese into
their slate night and purple winter sled as they
swim first out of the cold dense moss water into
the filmy air then the snow acts as if it's coming and the
Geese clouds freeze up and then change and shift
Guiding the drifting geese up to Canada where
they begin their journey South.
It's a reverse flight effect, just like when the key of
A doesn't work on your keyboard
and you keep smashing it and smashing it
Until you are just about to begin working in S and then
it works and you can begin your word journey all over again.
Get it, she said to him?
He rolled over. He heard it all before.
He's a dog, she thought.
What would he know about geese clouds?
--lw

Poem of the Day

Els Moor

op het dak van het huis met de windwijzer zet een reiger een steile vlucht af de gasten wandelen traag naar de tot aan de rand gevulde vijver dit is een middag en het regent ramen zijn deuren om doorheen te stappen een hond rent achter het kind op het gazon stemmen blijven hangen boven het gras het geluid wordt gedempt door het geluid van de snelweg de man die ongevraagd naar boven liep slaapt met het gezicht diep in de kussens op het feest is iemand onwel geworden op het feest loopt altijd iemand met een strop om de hals de vuilniszak hangt aan de klink van de deur het mes wordt in de cake gezet

on the roof of the house with the wind vane a heron takes off on a steep incline all the guests walk slowly to the pond that is filled to the brim this is an afternoon and it’s raining windows become doors to step through a dog chases after a child on the lawn voices stay behind above the grass the sound is muffled by the sound of the motorway the man who went upstairs without asking is asleep with his head deep in the pillows at the party someone is being sick at the party there’s always someone with a noose around his neck the bin liner hangs from the door handle a knife is stuck into the cake © 2006, Els Moors From: er hangt een hoge lucht boven ons Publisher: Nieuw Amsterdam, Amsterdam, 2006 ISBN: 90 468 0015 6 © Translation: 2008, Willem Groenewegen- on the roof of the house with the wind vane

And from the above poem from Amsterdam, beget this poem from me...a true story.


The Sun Parlor

In the Sun Parlor the man with the blanket wrapped around his legs isn't dead yet. His mouth is open and his breath comes in whistles and stops, a slight moaning is heard from his chest, his top teeth are missing. His cheeks are sucked in where once he was fat with drink and jolly. His arm is swollen with fluid, his hand has a bluish tint to it.

Upstairs the daughter of the man with the blanket wrapped around his legs
sips coffee from a styrofoam cup. She reaches into a box on the nightstand
and pulls out a lipstick, swirling it up and down while she cradles the
phone between shoulder and ear and talks. Every now and again a sob escapes from her throat and she catches it by putting her hand over her mouth as if she is coughing.

A few rooms over from the dying man dinner is being served. Macaroni is being spooned into bright plates and the people around the table chatter as if nothing is different or out of place.
Another daughter passes the cheese. His son spreads butter evenly and deliberately over
a slice of crusty italian bread. The sun shines brightly through the old panes of glass in the windows. People are always eating in this house.

In the room where the dying man lies, a young man sits near the body, talking
softly. He recounts the score of the recent football game, talks about the draft choices from his grandfather's favorite team, tells the man about his new girlfriend.
Quietly he wipes a tear from his face. They are streaming steadily as the man's breathing becomes more and more labored, eventually pouring like water from a drain pipe on the ledge of the big old stucco house.
This is the hardest thing he's ever had to do. Everyone cries when they enter this room.

--lisa walsh

Three Short Poems - August 12th

1.
I watch a cat skulk through the night
over a box
black
barely seeing but green eyes
blinking slowly. barely touching
the ground.
What would you do
if it were me?
the shifting light from gray to
purple to day. What would you then do?
Appearing. under the door.
As if on a stage. Not always tears.

2.
Your gray whiskers
forced whispers
held onto my wrist
your bony fingers
like strumming a string
on a guitar
my blood rushing
your skin flushed
stroking your cheek for
a moment I thought you stopped
breathing
but it was just me.

3.
she called out the night to him.
Escaping. Through
fog and rain.
and then the summer sky.
There was the moon. now.
and periods and commas.
Song.
The one bird was singing alone
as if in a vast church
the Madonna watching
and listening.
and then it came.
death too quickly.
riding away on a
rickety ole bike,
chain falling.