margrethe-h-k - Hello Poetry

How the trees lean to the south where the sun swallows the day How the moon at night will push her over the western edge spilling colors into the sea How in the garden at night I make my way through shadow following the music of loons their sad blue notes rising into a glossy sky sparkled with stars forever falling

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Nov 27, 2014

Nov 27, 2014 at 10:06 AM UTC

margrethe-h-k

Homesick

How the trees lean to the south where the sun swallows the day How the moon at night will push her over the western edge spilling colors into the sea How in the garden at night I make my way through shadow following the music of loons their sad blue notes rising into a glossy sky sparkled with stars forever falling

12

I find my mother in the strawberry field Not far from the river, kneeling in the dirt the sun beats down her back gray hair ruffling in a hot wind It hasn’t rained in a month and the earth is an old woman’s face, cracked with longing I kneel beside her, our hands on the dusty earth This earth that she has dug every spring kneeled upon every summer Barefoot and sun burnt, plucking ripe red fruit For pies and jams Juice-stained lips and tired backs My mother and her mother, on the porch Sipping Sherry in sunsets of July’s and Augusts, year after year Comparing blisters, freckles, wrinkles, lives Buckets of strawberries overflowing in the kitchen sink This year the strawberries are withered ***** red raisins on my tongue That taste bitter and sharp I watch my mother, keening softly on the ground Her heart peeled open and raw I whisper to her, The dead don’t live very far away Her swollen grey eyes search the field across the river As if she expects to see Grandma standing there Waving, mouthing soundless words on the air I know when it’s her turn to change worlds, it will be me, Kneeling here, in the sun’s bright assault My own daughter by my side, Witness to this grief, Her soft, comforting voice, telling me, The dead don’t live very far away.

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Nov 23, 2014

Nov 23, 2014 at 12:48 PM UTC

margrethe-h-k

Strawberry Field

I find my mother in the strawberry field Not far from the river, kneeling in the dirt the sun beats down her back gray hair ruffling in a hot wind It hasn’t rained in a month and the earth is an old woman’s face, cracked with longing I kneel beside her, our hands on the dusty earth This earth that she has dug every spring kneeled upon every summer Barefoot and sun burnt, plucking ripe red fruit For pies and jams Juice-stained lips and tired backs My mother and her mother, on the porch Sipping Sherry in sunsets of July’s and Augusts, year after year Comparing blisters, freckles, wrinkles, lives Buckets of strawberries overflowing in the kitchen sink This year the strawberries are withered ***** red raisins on my tongue That taste bitter and sharp I watch my mother, keening softly on the ground Her heart peeled open and raw I whisper to her, The dead don’t live very far away Her swollen grey eyes search the field across the river As if she expects to see Grandma standing there Waving, mouthing soundless words on the air I know when it’s her turn to change worlds, it will be me, Kneeling here, in the sun’s bright assault My own daughter by my side, Witness to this grief, Her soft, comforting voice, telling me, The dead don’t live very far away.

32

Outside the sky clogs like bruises I lay in bed and smoke, thinking you have disappointed me for the last time I dream I am in bed with a new lover watching my reflection in his eyes The way he says my name, like prayer like scripture as if he has come into a sacred place and each touch must preserve even while it plunders Last night the bed was a nest of nerves and wrong turns knees bumping out of rhythm the scraping of teeth my ring catching your skin And the red luminous glow of the alarm clock measuring the long hours of frustration Then the crack of a beer can opening and the sound of your **** splashing across the toilet seat in the dark And in that moment I knew the problem was you and not the absence of my *******

0

Oct 31, 2014

Oct 31, 2014 at 10:27 AM UTC

margrethe-h-k

The Problem

Outside the sky clogs like bruises I lay in bed and smoke, thinking you have disappointed me for the last time I dream I am in bed with a new lover watching my reflection in his eyes The way he says my name, like prayer like scripture as if he has come into a sacred place and each touch must preserve even while it plunders Last night the bed was a nest of nerves and wrong turns knees bumping out of rhythm the scraping of teeth my ring catching your skin And the red luminous glow of the alarm clock measuring the long hours of frustration Then the crack of a beer can opening and the sound of your **** splashing across the toilet seat in the dark And in that moment I knew the problem was you and not the absence of my *******

23

In the watermark of night we are black shadows swaying hands finding hips finding thighs in the dark blades aligned we cut stars in ice back arching in your hands my hair sweeps a frozen lake arms stretching distant skies under the taunt of stars you pull me in your face in the moon winter’s song longing your lips salty red flowers I will taste

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Oct 31, 2014

Oct 31, 2014 at 10:24 AM UTC

margrethe-h-k

Winter's Song

In the watermark of night we are black shadows swaying hands finding hips finding thighs in the dark blades aligned we cut stars in ice back arching in your hands my hair sweeps a frozen lake arms stretching distant skies under the taunt of stars you pull me in your face in the moon winter’s song longing your lips salty red flowers I will taste

18

I stand with the living under a smoke filled pavilion where shots of whiskey fill tall glasses and dogs run free Someone sings my eulogy on a karaoke machine children color my headstone with Sapphire Blue and Burnt Orange #10 The music of my dying sweeps across the gaping earth on a dusty wind fills it with the voices of the living My children fly kites in the field yelling out the stories of their births You were born in a snowstorm You were born under a full moon I was born at sunrise! the baby yells The kites swirl, tangle fall They huddle and cry I feel the world crack open Remember me, whispers the dust

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Oct 30, 2014

Oct 30, 2014 at 12:54 PM UTC

margrethe-h-k

Dust

I stand with the living under a smoke filled pavilion where shots of whiskey fill tall glasses and dogs run free Someone sings my eulogy on a karaoke machine children color my headstone with Sapphire Blue and Burnt Orange #10 The music of my dying sweeps across the gaping earth on a dusty wind fills it with the voices of the living My children fly kites in the field yelling out the stories of their births You were born in a snowstorm You were born under a full moon I was born at sunrise! the baby yells The kites swirl, tangle fall They huddle and cry I feel the world crack open Remember me, whispers the dust

20

The way he blows the smoke out his eyelids slightly lowering I know he wants me I touch my finger to the rim of the glass tell another lie There’s a way people draw things out of you in strange places veils lift change find new faces All night he’s watched me behind a screen of smoke And then the temperature reached one-hundred-and-ten, I say so I just rappelled the rest of the way down naked I look at him lick the salt on my finger Surprise crosses my face not salt but pomegranate sugar sweet the color of blood He pulls my hand to his lips his tongue a thick slug of suction compressing my finger to the roof of his mouth Teeth graze my knuckle For several seconds my eyes can’t rotate

0

Oct 29, 2014

Oct 29, 2014 at 12:49 PM UTC

margrethe-h-k

The Color of Blood

The way he blows the smoke out his eyelids slightly lowering I know he wants me I touch my finger to the rim of the glass tell another lie There’s a way people draw things out of you in strange places veils lift change find new faces All night he’s watched me behind a screen of smoke And then the temperature reached one-hundred-and-ten, I say so I just rappelled the rest of the way down naked I look at him lick the salt on my finger Surprise crosses my face not salt but pomegranate sugar sweet the color of blood He pulls my hand to his lips his tongue a thick slug of suction compressing my finger to the roof of his mouth Teeth graze my knuckle For several seconds my eyes can’t rotate

26

Sitting up late watching the Munsters and eating cheese popcorn and listening to my teeth crackle and writing down whatever this mixed up mind sends to the hands through the pen that’s chewed to the end and three days of ***** dishes stuffed in the oven where I don’t have to look at them and I wish I was somewhere exotic drinking White Russians and dancing to some Cajun beat with a tall dark-haired stranger I once saw in a dream back in the days of sleep-ins and late nights of laugh therapy before the days of real therapy and heavy sessions of what happened to me when I was five or fifteen or that night I got a little too close to that guy in the other lane and sunrises were a walk home after a night of who cares and where was I anyway?

0

Oct 27, 2014

Oct 27, 2014 at 12:31 PM UTC

margrethe-h-k

Where Was I?

Sitting up late watching the Munsters and eating cheese popcorn and listening to my teeth crackle and writing down whatever this mixed up mind sends to the hands through the pen that’s chewed to the end and three days of ***** dishes stuffed in the oven where I don’t have to look at them and I wish I was somewhere exotic drinking White Russians and dancing to some Cajun beat with a tall dark-haired stranger I once saw in a dream back in the days of sleep-ins and late nights of laugh therapy before the days of real therapy and heavy sessions of what happened to me when I was five or fifteen or that night I got a little too close to that guy in the other lane and sunrises were a walk home after a night of who cares and where was I anyway?

1

Gray-curving slopes Wind-washed creek beds Foxes bones, starched white under a cold sun Shivers of grass Smell of clay, pine ***** They stand together, nostrils flared The spine of a dark morning Stretching awake.

0

Oct 27, 2014

Oct 27, 2014 at 12:29 PM UTC

margrethe-h-k

What Dogs Dream

Gray-curving slopes Wind-washed creek beds Foxes bones, starched white under a cold sun Shivers of grass Smell of clay, pine ***** They stand together, nostrils flared The spine of a dark morning Stretching awake.

9

My mother has run away again, I find the note on the kitchen counter next to an overflowing ashtray of butts covered in lipstick My sister reads in and laughs, “The divorce thing again,” she tosses it in the trash and says, “It’s pizza night.” When my father gets home he knows she’s gone by the sound of a blaring radio and unrestrained laughter in the kitchen I have flour in my hair, my sister is wiping tomato sauce off her face with the front of her shirt He stands in the doorway without speaking, tilting sideways his tired body leaning into the frame Our eyes meet, and I think how handsome he still is with so many losses inside “It’ll be alright,” I say, but something in his face breaks already parts of him falling away We hold him in the doorway his head resting between our shoulders Just low enough so I can read my sister’s lips when she mouths the word ***** and shakes her head I imagine our mother in some air-conditioned hotel room down by the river ordering room service and cigarettes Sprawled across the bed, sipping scotch and watching her favorite show a half-smile at the edge of her mouth knowing she’ll get her way

0

Oct 27, 2014

Oct 27, 2014 at 12:29 PM UTC

margrethe-h-k

Pizza Night

My mother has run away again, I find the note on the kitchen counter next to an overflowing ashtray of butts covered in lipstick My sister reads in and laughs, “The divorce thing again,” she tosses it in the trash and says, “It’s pizza night.” When my father gets home he knows she’s gone by the sound of a blaring radio and unrestrained laughter in the kitchen I have flour in my hair, my sister is wiping tomato sauce off her face with the front of her shirt He stands in the doorway without speaking, tilting sideways his tired body leaning into the frame Our eyes meet, and I think how handsome he still is with so many losses inside “It’ll be alright,” I say, but something in his face breaks already parts of him falling away We hold him in the doorway his head resting between our shoulders Just low enough so I can read my sister’s lips when she mouths the word ***** and shakes her head I imagine our mother in some air-conditioned hotel room down by the river ordering room service and cigarettes Sprawled across the bed, sipping scotch and watching her favorite show a half-smile at the edge of her mouth knowing she’ll get her way

25

Between frozen foods and dairy I bump into a brief ex Hey, he says pointing to the beef burritos in my cart, You’re not a vegetarian anymore? Above our heads a voice crackles over a faulty intercom, “Assistance needed in the meat department” Pink flowers held behind him Axe stinking up aisle 4 He eyes the chocolate donuts and six pack sitting on top of a 20lb bag of cat food Ready for the weekend, huh? In the parking lot I accidentally scrape his car three times I leave a note on the windshield *Your recognizing my face Doesn’t mean you know me*

0

Oct 27, 2014

Oct 27, 2014 at 11:33 AM UTC

margrethe-h-k

Midnight at Krogers

Between frozen foods and dairy I bump into a brief ex Hey, he says pointing to the beef burritos in my cart, You’re not a vegetarian anymore? Above our heads a voice crackles over a faulty intercom, “Assistance needed in the meat department” Pink flowers held behind him Axe stinking up aisle 4 He eyes the chocolate donuts and six pack sitting on top of a 20lb bag of cat food Ready for the weekend, huh? In the parking lot I accidentally scrape his car three times I leave a note on the windshield *Your recognizing my face Doesn’t mean you know me*

17