Every minute that I wait for you
I will be longing for your arms
for the solace of your comfort
for the tenderness of your lips
While I am driving home
I will be wishing to have arrived.
You may not believe it’s true
but I always long to be with you.
Dad came for a visit
and we discussed laundry soap
in my dream.
He didn’t ask about Mom,
and I didn’t tell him.
The sky is dusty
crystalline mist
glistening air.
This is not
a sign of spring.
She says she’s not waiting for a handsome prince
and laughs like she’s joking.
But she had a handsome prince
and she she treated him like a frog,
so if one was to come along now,
I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t even recognize him.
“a man in a kilt will always be more appealing than anyone in lederhosen.”
~Diana Gabaldon
The appeal is likely the easier peeling?
The world is flocked white
and I stretch my toes searching for your lingering warmth.
Absent.
It’s slow on the road today,
highway’s slick and I wish I could take a sick day.
Absent.
The world is flocked white
like it’s powdered me on the trees; I’m empty.
Absent.
The world is flocked white
I want to abrogate responsibility and hibernate.
Absent.
Star speckled sky,
orbs orbiting,
motes in the sun beams,
circles circling,
dots on the shoes.
The most beautiful things in the world are round,
so I will celebrate my celestial shape.
Stacks of articles, demanding my brain
focus and think logically.
Assignment instructions I just want to avoid.
My students drive me crazy when they show this sentiment.
But then, I’ll actually get the work done
(on time)
despite the procrastination,
which they frequently do not.
So many papers. So tired from report cards and marking stacks of late assignments and prepping for a new semester and February.
So.
Tired.
But the end is in sight.
I can’t give up now.
The ground hog says
it will be early spring
but even if he did not,
the blue sky and balmy breeze
today asserted its own opinion.
There at the bottom of the bag
is that precious photo
of the beloved man, now gone.
You have torn it into shreds,
torn my respect for you,
torn my love of you,
torn my heart in two.
It was not enough that he adored
and worshipped you?
You were blinder than him,
though he had the account with CNIB.
Your bitterness is poison
and I will not drink it.
Shawn L. Bird 