NaMoWriPo #28: I was going to try for a few more poems tonight, but I just want to stop here as I'm outta gas. The next poem I publish here I'll work on it first not one of these quick takes.

I was listening to my son doing his nightly routine thinking about how his days are shaped by his “little marches”. He has done this type of comfort or need to walk/run for many years. He started doing it sometime once he started going to school and it has expanded over the years. The noises are comforting and communicate for him his mood and it is just his daily song. I love hearing him! Sometimes I do not hear it and I’ll be on the phone and someone will ask me about what the noise is and I’ll say, “Oh, that’s just my son. He’s happy.”

 Spectrum Exercise

Your heavy footfalls on wooden floors

One, two, three, four

He and I on a happy day a year ago!

Often a march or romp

This you do in the mornings

A slow slide across the floor

Mid-morning a bounce

That gets you out the door

To return in the afternoon

Up and down like a rushing wave

From your domicile to the living room

Round the kitchen and back

Cackling with giggles at invisible companions

Or a secret phrase or thought

It comes not in ones but twos

Threes or more

Stomping it out on the floor

Dancing wildly while laughing

In the evening it is time to pace

A race of words coming

Politics, weather is your tether

Your chase of thoughts

That swing round and round

As the ball is trapped 'round the pole

And words have run out

The soldier’s step

Returns and you are

Grunting and groaning

A gleeful tune

That is all your own

With song embedded

As sighs and slides of scales

Crooning loudly, fitting you together

filling in the cracks

that have formed as you dealt

with more than you thought you could or should

A putting away of the day

Contented to be at home

Headed to the winddown

You shut the door

Until tomorrow’s exercise resumes

 

NaMoWriPo #27

Give Me a Clue

In the mornings poems flow

On the way to work, I go

In the evening nothing’s there

Yes, the cupboard is completely bare

If only I could capture quick

Thoughts that are like a thrown stick

I have no faithful companion to retrieve them

If I did I wouldn’t run

Into problems walking from room to room

Feeling like an empty loom

Where someone forgets

As soon as she sits

To type this up for you

Then she hasn’t a clue

 NaMoWriPo #26: Perfunctory tonight, but I had to do it. I feel sooooooooo much better than a year ago! The picture is me sitting on my couch a couple of hours out of surgery feeling horrible with a long recovery ahead of me. Now, I’m really glad I went through with it as it is lovely to be pain-free! Many thanks to my husband, son, sister, and friends who kept me going during my recovery.

Shoulder Good as New

It has been a year

Since muscle was anchored and scraped

To be sewn back to where it had escaped

Afraid of the cure more than the pain

Was hard for me to explain

To people who don’t put up with such crap

They get it done before they snap

I on the other hand let it slide

Ignoring the inconvenient side

So, I can’t raise my left arm

What could be the harm?

Each month my shoulder

Feels more like a dead boulder

Except for the active ache

That keeps me constantly awake

So, I gave in and set the date

A year later I feel really great!

Normal feeling and function

has given me more gumption

To not postpone fixing pain

To repeat this cycle would be insane

 NaMoWriPo #25: The orchid I’ve somehow kept alive for 6 years now!

 

Orchid Choir

Green spidery legs

Sticking out from stick-like roots

Do not scream beauty

Curved brown branches

Change into velvety lime

Where first bulbs explode

Looking like strange alien pods

Waiting for small beings

To crawl out and greet us

One day the pods unfold

One at a time revealing

Round snow-colored petals

Who turns toward the sun

Greeting her revealing their freckles

Flecked with sharp pinks,

And tiny bits of orange

That seems to bounce

As each bud pops

They harmonize together

Giving grace to the room

 NaMoWriPo #24: I will say that this doesn’t happen as much anymore but when it does, this is how I feel. My adult autistic son handles so many things better than he used to but when he needs me, I feel it.

 Emergency Contact

Driving to get you

Your voice jarred

What was not new

From a space deep

That rose to the surface

The bruises that stay hidden

Until an emergency

That used to be a daily

Someone says, “Come now”

Back then voices of strangers, teachers, friends

This moment is yours

“come now” startled me

And I slid into a place

That cut down where

The whispered worries

Party all night

To say you are not all right

I stare at those tender patches

That appeared with the tears

Pushed by fears and panic

Borrowed from you

It bellows from me

As I race to be with you

NaMoWriPo #22 I’m just feeling a bit whiney with my husband embarking on a trip for the weekend. He’s headed to a funeral and anymore when we are separated, I think about the bigger gulf that happens when one of us will be alone ultimately and I dread it for either of us.

 Poem #23 is a dumping of things that happen in teaching special ed. Emotions are smooshed into a poem as I've got to put them somewhere.

 

Separation Anxiety

I don’t want to go to bed

Because you aren’t there

There’s no point in making dinner

As I am making it for one

Going out isn’t on my agenda

because I can’t converse with you

Gone are the things I want to do

Without my love, without my love

 

Elephant’s Room

Commentary comes in all forms

Fast and furious

Fueled by joy or anger

It can be a stranger

That delivers the final straw

They hold over you

Saying they’ll sue

For a tiny thing done

Or left undone

You are shunned

Put on hold

Slapped with cold

Hard, icy fingers

That squeezes the life

Out of what you enjoyed

You avoid doing more

Because of what is

Is being judged

Drug through the mud

Because it was issued

That you were not perfect

At “thus and so”

But you didn’t know

How to serve

In a way to save

The day for this person

That expected a lot

More than you sought to give

You live with an open heart

To make your little space as welcoming

That you can

To span further than rules

In schools that box kids in

You think it is a sin

Making your head spin

That they won’t forgive

Letting you in

Where these strangers have been

To resend pulling from the right bin

The one where the elephant lives

 NaMoWriPo #21: Too many thoughts tonight. “When a door closes a window opens,” I think is the saying. What happens when all you have is a closed door and the window never opens? That combined with these magazine covers I saw the other day in the drugstore made me think…

 Nine Lives

Time steals away on soft cat-like paws

Leaping lightly from surface to perch

To lurch to a halt

Lingering at the window

Silently hunting from safety

Desire pulsing for the prey

Just out of reach

It lays down

Resolved to watch

Tail twitching

Eyes dilated seeing everything

Wanting more now

It wriggles slightly

Settling in

Waiting patiently

For the door to open

Before what is taunting it

Gets away