You keep on recycling your
"I'm Sorry"
For new mistakes

And I keep on recycling
"I forgive you"
My always mistake

Which face will I wear today
    The face I wear at work
          Cheerful member of the staff
          Underpaid - unappreciated
           Tiny office with no window
           Paperwork nobody looks at
           Rules just for the sake of rules

Which face will I wear today
      The face I wear at home
            Always tired, depressed, besieged
            by a thousand minor ailments
            All the things I'd like to do
             crowded out by other things
             I have to do that are no fun.
      
Which face will I wear today
      The face that sports a poet's cap
            Gel filled quill pen clutched in hand
            Trying every format I can learn
            Gleaning from the published experts
            Writing happy after years of sad
            Finding sunshine in the shadows that I live in

Which face will I wear today
      The face above the helping hands
            that reach for places to be used
            That garner joy from mucking in
            to smooth the path for others
            Seldom thanked - often refused
            Bucket goal - to save a life.

Which face will I wear today
      The face that looks back from the mirror
            Mapping all the tracks of age
            Searching for the sparkle in the eyes
            that joined hands with my youthful looks
            and did a conga-line away

Which face will I wear today
      Picasso portrait of them all
            Ill and hale - strong and weak - sad and glad
            When seen together in the mirror
            it's a face I do not know
            and someone I don't care to meet

So check the clock and choose a face
    Paste it on and smooth it out
        Comb hair over all the edges
             **** the light and close the door
                 And take this face out for a walk
                       See if anybody says hello
                                           ljm

This is the story of an aching love.
A hopeless schoolgirl kind of thing.
He was a basketball star player on
The Monticello Mustangs team,
Not showy, but quiet and a little shy.
He was glorious to look at
through the lenses of my brown eyes.
I had to work to learn his name-
it was Finnish, spelled Laulainen.
I said it lots of different ways until I heard
somebody say it right-
Ed     Law lie’ nen
All the bells rang out and bluebirds sang
As I crooned and whispered that magic name
In the quiet of my room.
I never had a class with him-
he was a year ahead.  
He wasn’t part of rowdiness
when passing in the halls
from one lesson to the next.
If he walked past I turned into
A pillar of salt dyed crimson
From the blood that burst my heart.
I don’t recall now how I came to have it
But I had a small creased snapshot of him and
I slept with it under my pillow every night.
I touched it and looked at it and imagined
him touching me.  The thought of him
kissing me was far beyond my wildest dreams
I suspect my mom knew it was there,
but she never said a word
And I guarded it like my virginity.
And my best friend had no idea.
He never knew I was alive-
he didn’t know my name.
I was one of the nameless girls
That are present but unseen.
One day I was sent to the cafeteria
For something the teacher needed.
Standing by the now closed door
Was God Who Walked The Earth,
Ed Laulainen in the flesh.
The shock of standing next to him
paralyzed my tongue.
I dared not look at him
and finally only said “Is anybody there”.
Did he answer - I don’t know.
I was terrified and in paroxysms
of ecstasy. I was sharing the same air he breathed.
He left Junior High for Senior High and I lost track of him.
But I loved him with ferocious fervor and wishful longing
If desire could have made him mine, Midas would have
been poor by comparison.
OccasionallyI think of him and the plain little girl who worshipped him.
Where did he go - how did  he grow - what kind of life did he live.
In ten more years the little girl could have most anyone she wanted
but the crinkled photo stayed in a trinket box for a long,long time before
it washed away on the tides of new loves, real loves, and living.
I wish I could see him once again to tell him the story of
the little girl who chose him to love with all her soul and first flush of emotion.
                                   ljm

M y love is like a red, red rose
Y oung with the dew-kissed promises of spring.

L aden with unique perfume,
O n a slender stalk it blooms
V ery near the edge of a sunlit garden,
E ndlessly transforming but always the same.

I  offer you this rose in hopes that
S someday fields of them will shine.

L oving you turns ugly weeds
I nto rare exotic blossoms that
K iss the summer breezes with their scent
E ven as they wither and turn brown.

A bsolute perfection is my love and this red flower.

R each out and touch this rose I offer-
E very thorn is gentle and not sharp-
D o  not fear of hurt from it.

R ather fill your senses with the joy of it,
E ndlessly fresh within your hand, and never
D ying, only changing to become more sweet.

R eceive this gift I bring to you and
O nly let me be that rose
S o  that my soul lies in your hand and heart for all
E ternity.
<< >>

Digging after some small perfect diamond
To place into a hand that never fondled one before
Nor could even hold one now,
It’s corporeal being burned away in grieving,
I reach for my pen
I cannot find it with my vision pulsing so in liquid sorrow.
It is mislaid among the clutter
That ***** traps my days and roils my mind in darkened hours
      

No book of rules and regulations
To warn the jar holds just one quart
So all the pushing of the liquid
Will not fit a gallon in
And I will have to mop the spill

Verses spelled on ***** sidewalks
Written in 3 shades of chalk
Embellished with fantastic flowers
Only end up walked across
And smudged from recognition
                        ljm

Why must I make my poem rhyme
she scoffed as though it was a crime

Seven and three quarter years
beneath her belt, she held back tears


Because, the teacher slowly said,
it's how it's done and how it's read

Now finish please and when you're done
off to recess quickly run


'But what if what they've done is wrong'
her body small, but head so strong

The foot she stomped sized merely three
her ribbon tied so carelessly


What ever do you mean my child?
And what is making you so wild?

A poem rhymes a bird it flies
but not a chicken, though hard it tries


Now tell me what's got in to you?
What is it that you want to do?

What are these words of which you speak?
That make you make the floor boards creek?

That make raise your voice to me?
The one who knows how things should be!


The little girl walked to her chair
Her poem waiting for her there

And tried to see the paper clear
though far she could, could not see near


And when she spoke her words aloud,
she stood so tall, and looked so proud

'My teacher is the greatest, the best I've ever had, I love her and she is  the nicest and most smart'
        the young girl cried with all her heart.


The teachers eyes welled up with tears
having spent a hundred thankless years

Wiping noses and reprimanding,
with parents always so demanding


And looking round the empty room,
it suddenly lost all it's gloom

She picked up the girl and held her near,
' To hell with all the rules my dear'

And from her apple took a bite,
and said I was wrong and you were correct

There was never any keeping us part

It was physics as much as it was madness

Drawn together, compelled maybe, I'm just not sure

One plus, one minus, both magnetized, cocked and fully loaded.

In a single fluid motion from strangers to lovers to so entangled and entwined, so inextricably linked we long ago lost sight of where one of us Begins and the other ends

I don't think it's healthy

It can't be healthy

To need the other to breathe, to drink you as my water, to be your cure, to consume ourselves so completely, hours pass in minutes, days in moments, I miss you when I'm with you, I miss me when I'm not, and I'm no longer entirely sure which is which

I don't think it's healthy

I think the pace is quickening.  I can feel it but I don't know where and I know I should, but I don't want it to slow down.

People are starting to notice.

They're attracted and afraid, were just too close, too connected, fiercely loyal, but running like a freight train unbalanced, pitched at 45°, swinging around a pass on a mountain side overlooking a bottomless ravine and we've both stopped conducting.  

I think we're into deep,

                                   but I like it


so please, write back soon.