I’m on a site celebrating my adopted culture
when someone asks which of us were exchange students.
Suddenly there are 50 comments:
their years, their homes, their hosts.
Someone writes to me from Australia,
“We were there at the same time. I wonder if we met?”
Imagine that.
A virtual rendez-vous decades later.
A tiny marble, this globe; we can
almost hold it in our hands.
Last week reports of your smiles and charm,
surprised us. Did they have the right patient?
I am fast asleep when the phone rings this morning.
You’re shrieking at me.
I know you’re angry and afraid,
but I can’t deal with you
and a pandemic, too.
Somebody is messing around
sprinkling snow on the ground in April!
Too late for the fool. There should be rules about this!
We’re stuck inside, forgetting to wash, dress, or sleep.
Dealing with stress by baking and crafting, making new courses.
Things are seriously off-track, keeping distance with my hacking coughs,
but then outside the window, the final straw: snow.
That’s it.
This is shit.
What an unexpected gift
revealed by retreating snow:
crocuses planted so long ago
Finally bloom when w most need
symbols of hope.
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(True story. I planted a couple of dozen crocuses into the front lawn in the early 2000s when we first bought this house. The bloomed on their own for three or four years before they stopped – likely victims of hubby’s herbicide. Suddenly, after so many years, 2 popped up this year!)
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I stay at home on quarantine;
I am not feeling serene.
Mexican vacation’s been
cancelled, and I was so keen
to escape from all the snow.
Caribbean sunset glow?
Basking on a sandy shore?
Travel’s bad right now, I know. 😦
We already had t. p.
no panic necessary.
Asthma inhaler ready.
Home holiday with hubby.
I will unpack my suitcase
Stuff the new swimsuit some place,
Wash your hands! Don’t touch your face!
Hope we all survive with grace.
(A poem on life in the COVID19 pandemic)
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Oh false friend!
Yesterday, blue skies smiling sweetly,
warm sun embraces,
led to
short sleeves and picnic tables.
Today, an inch of new snow tops the table
and sky is full of malice,
tiny shards of ice,
stabbing the heart of spring.
Winter wins another round.
If I refuse to wear my boots,
choose a light jacket instead of that coat,
keep my feet on gravel, ignore snow piles,
can I force winter to go?
Beguile spring with my wiles?
Look up!
Opalescent sky,
lavender pink kissed,
pearl shimmering;
sun setting behind pines,
blushing beauty,
dipping under mountains.
Periwinkle sky
In the eaves trough tinkle the trickles
of melting snow.
Hope for spring
burst by tomorrow’s
forecast.
I have been reading through your story
in short bits. Your words hurt
my heart. It is so much work for some
people to survive from day to day. They
don’t deserve their painful realities, and my
opportunities are so apparent,
under my reading lamp.
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#firstnationsauthors #indigenousauthor
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Shawn L. Bird 