They call each other ‘J.’ John picks
red, red roses in Mansfield Park and brings
them to Jane. She explains instant karma to him.

In heaven Jane wears her hair short, sports
fringed bellbottoms and teashades.
John has meat on his bones now; prefers black slacks

and button ups, a trucker hat from Abbey Road.
They take long drives and often sing songs.
He says they’ll remain lovers. Until the end.

Jane’s novels now contain leather, VW buses,
electricity, space shuttles, computers, Madonna and Marilyn
Monroe. The rock’n’roll makes her sway her hips in the rain.

John likes himself with peace. This morning
he will play guitar and sing ‘For He Was Rich, and
She Was Handsome to the tune of ‘Happiness is a Warm Gun.’

Jane will two-step and whistle. Alone
by the fireplace later, they’ll listen to the raindrops
and doze. They will not think of Mr. Darcy

or Yoko Ono. They know why God made them
roommates. It’s because the world
was their playground. It’s because

an artist cannot do anything
slovenly. It’s because
all you need is love.

Metal contraption, I dutifully climb into you each day as the sun rises
and drive your clunky frame through the hills of a crowded campus
to face the questions and stares of the kindhearted and heartless.

I prefer you in short increments and, on weekdays only please
but I’m strapped into your metal ways at almost all times
and jostle along with each bump and crack in the sidewalk.

I hold tight to your rubber arms as we travel down the steep hills
and plow you through old man winters blinding white ways
for long stretches, in between short, fitful summers

I’m not pretending that I never curse you, because I do,
for sticking in gravel, grass and grout, breaking down
every Monday, or your front wheel falling off again

and yet you carry me faithfully to and from school and home
where I jump to the floor and embrace freedom and movement
until I climb again from bed and into mobility and its adventurous ways.

Life comes in increments of sixteen weeks where each week she composes list after list.
Wastes away inside with textbooks and tests instead of spending the day in the sunshine.
Her mind wanders, up and away, into her dreams where she lives a different sort of life.
As others are falling into soft slumber in the night’s silence she is kept awake by thoughts
that make her weary of war and weather both. She prays nightly for dear Mother Earth
to take her people and bring them alive with singing in the streets in the dead of night

and to rock them to sleep with sweet lullabies as stars step away and day breaks night.
The girl looks at this life of hers and after some time in deep thought composes another list
to keep organized and to help her find a steady place to plant her feet on this big, big earth.
As she struggles each day with textbooks and tests and longs for the warmth of sunshine
work, school and a sad excuse for a social circle overwhelm her mind, spirit and thoughts.
Each day her mind grows heavier and she continues to wish for a different kind of life.

Somewhere where the sunset lasts a little bit longer. A sort of sweeter, simple life
where the streets are filled with the sound of music all day and through into the night
and where children can be children longer so that when they come upon the thoughts
that fill the heads of adults they won’t do as the woman living in a child’s world has and list
ways to escape to a place where she can do the dreamer’s dance and live in the sunshine
on the streets where music fills the air and smiling faces take up all the space on earth.

She desires to recycle her trash and plant trees in the salty spring air that occupies her earth
and to better herself, the lists say so, because there has to more than what’s seen in this life
that comes in sixteen week intervals filled with textbooks and tests. It seems the sunshine
would do all of us some good. Maybe the moon will allow her time to dance away the night
but it isn’t meant to be tonight. The halfway point shows eight weeks crossed off using lists
and eight more until she can run into the sunshine and not be consumed by her thoughts

because she’s no great philosopher. She would rather spend time in play than in thought.
Nobody wants to be lost in thought when they’ve yet to explore this mighty, mighty earth
with her blasted basalts, blue skies, and bubblegum scented paper on which she makes lists
after which the businessmen will be able to continue on with their polished, plush lives
in this white world where all that matters is green. But she, she’d rather dance the night
away where there’s music in the air and people walk the streets with pockets of sunshine.

In a land where there are no bad days and everyone carries a pocket full of sunshine
Is where she wants to exist. Trapped in a world where she escapes into her thoughts
Because nobody knows how silent and still the streets become when day turns to night
How many children go hungry and how many people don’t know their place on this earth
They want another chance at redemptions, a new beginning in a place to start a new life
And yet when everything else is over, she finds herself with nothing but crossed off lists

Here she stands at a crossroads left with nothing, only her beloved lists
She’ll have to tear a new path and find herself in this life
So she can make it to where they sing in the streets and dance away the night

I was three years out of high school and finally getting
the chance to grow up. I’d been ready since before
graduation day. Everybody in the world was certain
that I would fail. I couldn’t succeed. Thanks for the vote
of confidence. I am proving them wrong. I’m succeeding,
maybe not thriving, but succeeding right before their very eyes.

Success is living on my own. Being able to do every household
chore on my own. Success is getting myself to and from where
I need to be in my broken down, beat up wheelchair. Success
is budgeting my money each month. Success is not getting killed
and ***** on my walk home from work in the dark. Success is
living up to their standards and way of life. Success is faking a smile.

I’ve learned more about life in the last eight months than ever before.
I’ve made mistakes, just like they said I would. What they didn’t count
on was me learning from those mistakes and picking up the pieces.
They told me I wouldn’t last more than a month, six weeks at the most.
I would ***** up, fail miserably, get hurt and hospitalized. Thank you
for the boost of self-esteem. It’s made me tougher than steel.

I may not be the perfect student, skinny blonde *****, award winning
page designer or most eloquent writer. I may not speak Spanish fluently,
have loads of extra cash lying around or a motorized, state of the art
wheelchair. Stop telling me what I need. I don’t need or want any of them.

Success is living how I want to live. Success is a productive day when I want
nothing but hot tea and soft music. Success is having the confidence to ask
for help when I’ve been told I shouldn’t. Success is making friends who can
read through my masquerade. Success is facing the consequences. Success is
found through red ink marks and piles of papers. Success is not letting those
who don’t believe in me get the best of me. Success is sunshine on a cloudy day

The fire for learning Plato’s philosophies and the history hidden
behind the Iron Curtain had burned us out. We were restless, sleepy
and thirsty. Mischievous by nature, we were sick of going nowhere.

The blooms of the red schizanthus and yellow calla lilly’s against the sun
blazened sky bid us farewell as we traveled west toward the city of emerald raindrops.
After all, freedom was only one tank of gasoline, two Red Bulls, a bag of bugles,
a handful of mixed CD’s and four hours away. We were going to lose ourselves.

Plummeted forward by the up down, up down rollercoaster
of the seaside landscape our faces shine brighter than ever
because we find ourselves in rainy day adventures

Pike’s Place Market found us braving the stench of tuna, bass, salmon and sushi
for crepes and chai. Strawberry, vanilla and salmon crepes made by the man
with skin the color of milky chocolate and a foreign accent that we lusted after
because we’d never heard it before. We weren’t running away from home but instead
were living in African slums where the skin comes smooth like milk and
the music has a character, full of power and pride, of its own.

Wandering the drenched streets where downpours don’t stop the salesmen. The sax
player and the bread maker still ask us if we’d like a sample. Rain is no matter. Coveting
warmth from the storm we find a steel slab of a parking garage downtown where
mirrors on elevator ceilings occupy our time and attention until  security shooed us.
Shiny objects attract the shadows on the walls who proceed to make funny faces.

Watching America’s sport in cheap seats with over-priced beer and nachos
helps us remember our roots and value tradition a little more. It draws us closer to home
where any storm can be weathered. The drive home after a surprising win and
spirited riot is quiet. The crisp night air and booming bass free our minds of the
mischief caused as we chatter ourselves voiceless away from the emerald raindrops.

Where midnight is bright as day and time never does slow down
I find myself alone for the first time ever, walking along where
nobody knows who I am and they wouldn’t really care if they did.
Because they’ve got their own stories to fabricate and skeletons
to bury beneath onionskin layers. Two in the morning with my head
stretched to the sky and I find myself falling in love with a stranger.

Central Park is a castle with horse-drawn carriages and suddenly
I’m a scarlet-cheeked princess waiting for my naked cowboy to rescue
Me so we can run away and live in a quaint Brooklyn townhouse where
the children play ghetto games. I don’t want to live the lifestyle of the rich
and famous. Leave me to myself so I can wander the splendid city streets.

The man with wrinkles covering his ebony face and his ragged, dusty clothes
too big for his slender body sneaks a glance and sly grin at me before he picks
up his golden saxophone and serenades the subway passengers, bringing
sunshine and sultry smiles to their dark faces. He’s had a painful, wretched life
and the pain of losing a son, his first baby, to a grenade in a Middle Eastern desert
where the sun burns the soldiers’ skin as they spend hour after hour, looking for weapons they’ll never find.
The look in his eyes is clear. Making others smile, in the middle of the city subway is his heart’s content.
I drop a bill into his beaten up case and move along,
but that sweet sound overwhelming the hot, ***** air I’ll never forget.

I swear I can almost touch Pluto from where I sit, at the Top of the Rock, and the stars
are an arm’s stretch away. I can see past the Manhattan skyline and into Jersey.
I’ve seen the whole world tonight. How I wish I may, how I wish I might stay. Give me the crowded
streets and boutiques for keepsakes. I’ll pack them tightly into tissue paper and each
night when I’m ready to fly away from the small town girl living in a lonely world sort
of life I’ll make a wish and fall in love all over again in a city where nobody knows my name.

My grandfather was born in this one-stoplight town
and so was his Marilyn Monroe-esque mother.
They traveled west when he, with his club foot,
and his brother were small boys; wanna-be cowboys.

More than fifty years later my own father and I travel
down the same dirt road to say our farewell to our last piece
of family history. My great grandmother has finally found
her way home. We’ll spread her ashes in the nearby river.

The color in the wooden picket fence is washed out. The house
and big wrap-around porch lie back further. The current owners
aren’t home so instead of a tour each of us takes a peek inside
the dusty windows. Instantly, we’re taken back to the 1930’s
when putting bread and butter on the table what mattered
for a man with a young wife and two small sons.

My cousins and I spend most of our time getting lost. We usually
end up in the Super 1 Foods or sneaking into the hotel’s casino.
There’s a convenience store too. Montana leaves us both confused
and amazed. To us, this trip is just another excuse to miss school
and that big chemistry test we weren’t hadn’t yet studied for.

Our parents, aunts, uncles and grandmother weren’t just losing
the old, white-haired lady who lived in the basement. To them
she was ‘Nana’ and ‘Mom.’ They spent their days wrapped in memories
of their wedding day or birthday parties. “It can’t be. Tell me it’s not true,”
my own grandmother, wearing all black and too much make up cries.