Another storm warning.
Cotton clouds turn into coal smoke,
Flashes splice the sky.
We’re drenched by pelting rain,
until it blows by again.
Wouldn’t it be nice
if the newscaster flashed
storm warnings
about flashes of temper
and drenching tears,
so we knew to stay indoors
or prepare our rain gear?
What I want to know
is what the magical ingredient is.
What’s that essential something
that makes this kid go “WOW!”?
Not just this kid, but that kid, too.
You know how some will not be moved,
never seem to find their groove?
I want the magical ingredient for them all,
so when they’re pushed from their nests
they don’t fall, they aim for the skies with eyes
open to opportunity, head full of curiosity.
Every time I think I know the secret
I see another one sneaking by,
not willing to try or
afraid
to try?
What’s broken their curiosity?
Taught them to close out possibility?
It hurts me.
I want to know if that kid
is going to move to his groove later.
Will he save his curiosity to ride a wave
at twenty instead?
I want to see it now,
but late is better than never.
I hope when it happens,
I’ll know.
What’s the difference
between a weed and a flower?
It’s an old one
and a new one.
A blue bell, dandelion yellow one.
A weed
is flower seeding in an inconvenient place.
It just takes its space to put down roots.
It stretches its sights to the sky.
A weed has petals for joy,
nectar for bees,
and pollen for sneezes.
A weed is a flower in an inconvenient place,
Weed is just a label.
It doesn’t alter the beauty, the scent, or the colour.
Flower is just a snooty torment of summer name games.
Let the flowers be free!
Let their promise fly like weeds on the breeze!
Let’s be free of our labels,
be enabled
to bloom through the gloom.
What’s the difference between a weed and a flower?
Perspective.
Indeed.
.
.
(With thanks to Sheri D Wilson who asked the question, and Blu Hopkins who offered an old line)
Misty’s shoes
attended graduation,
tramping up and down the stairs,
standing at the podium as
name after name was read
each biography
each list of scholarships.
Dancing for young people,
leaping off into the unknown.
Misty’s shoes were there,
celebrating a roomful of potential
that Misty will never know.
.
.
.
A few years ago on eBay I purchased a pair of stunning black and white spectator pumps (Listen Up Harlow by John Fluevog). While corresponding with the seller, I was told that they were her deceased sister’s shoes. Misty had passed away from cystic fibrosis. I was touched by the story, and wrote a character named after her into the novel I was writing at the time. Misty loved shoes and dancing and her passions fueled her story line in Grace Awakening Myth. (GA Myth is still in editing and revisions. Not sure that sub-plot will make the cut, actually). Thinking about Misty while wearing her shoes at my school’s grad this week, I remembered young people I knew who passed away far too young.
It’s passing through time
moving on time
gotta go time.
It’s we’re through here
all done here
wrapping up here.
It’s wear the gown time;
cross the stage time;
toss the cap time;
No more waiting!
Celebrating
Graduating.
Valley green like velvet in the morning light
waves rippling, sun twinkling;
sun stars captured on water,
dazzling.
Everywhere are lush reminders
of blessing
rising with the water,
over-flowing with the creeks,
sliding with the mud.
Blessings and curses.
It could be worse.
It could be worse
than being trapped in paradise.
You’re a beacon, baby
Oh yeah.
You flicker like a flame
and I come to you.
I’m a lost ship.
I’m a moth.
You’re a candle
when the power’s out.
You’re a flashlight
slicing through the night.
You’re a beacon, baby.
Bring me home.
.
.
.
Hmm. Sounds like it wants to be a song, doesn’t it?
The demons are hiding around corners
lurking in the shadows
watching you.
I know you feel the weight
of their gaze
hear the clink of their weapons
every day.
On the sunny days,
you outrun them
find smiles to return to those
around you
in their circles of care.
Other days,
smiles are barred growls,
the glow of sinister eyes pacing
around you,
squeezing life and hope
as their circle crushes in,
suffocating you.
Your demons on their unwitting backs
Your demons in their unwitting smiles
Your demons on their unwitting feet
Your demons in their expectations
Your incessant demons
invisible to others,
writhing,
circling,
just
there.
Just when I think there’s been a change
Just when I think the brain’s been rearranged
Just when I think obstacles have been constrained
There’s a smash, crashing return to the old
The opening petals refuse to unfold
The rebirthing story will not be told
Just when I imagine, my hope’s short-changed.
Reality is bitterly cold.
My expectations are really what’s strange.
The light of you
twinkles on your skin
sends shooting stars crackling from the top of your head.
The light of you
glows blue green like phosphorescence
attracting, inviting.
You are bio-luminescence
shimmering on an ocean,
trails flowing after you like an evening gown.
I reach to dip my hand into the water and watch the light
die in my palm.
I long to live in your light,
bathe in the beauty,
float in the flotilla of the mesmerized, microscopic worshipers
flowing after you.
But you go your way
and I go home.
I gaze after you, and wonder if you’ve shared enough of you,
for me to generate light
of my own.
.
.
.
(for Sheri-D)
It’s always a let down at the end of a conference to leave the like minds of other writers, and return home to quotidian life. This was a particularly good conference for me, with lots of messages from the universe (or rather one that just kept coming up over and over). I am hopeful the words will be off on interesting journeys as a result of the learning.
Shawn L. Bird 