Wrangling Figures

Photo by Shabakin

 

Two herders     one red merle with copper white trim

the other Aussie Shepherd   black with blue swirls

red is larger than black&blue      less intense than little

I’ve seen them on runs    leashes at maximum extension

little leading big by a nose

Today they are in Sit position at their person’s feet

she’s scrolling a screen      they’re staring down a path

which I walk along       then glancing back

try to line up their gaze with an object

rabbit or squirrel or bird of gripping interest

They’re mirror expressions as they scan passersby

playing their intent eyes over features

dismissing strangers   seeking familiar

looking for a known pattern

gait, scent, hair, shape composing Theirs

Turning away I wonder if that’s my look at work

focused on dual monitors     data streaming by

letting formulas filter numbers for me

until a meaningful trend emerges

my accounting brain wags

 

January Free Generative Writing Workshop

 

 

photo by Tom Cochrane

 

 

 

 Victory Dance

I’m exultant on my in-laws’ upper landing
daylight trying to reach me through staircase window
glass expanse from midway landing to crown molding

wooden floorboards creak beneath me
in front of my husband’s boyhood bedroom
where we live

I’m celebrating an acceptance
a paper I’ll present to academics at a conference
like I’ve thought thoughts that will make me famous

swing fists in front of hips
pulse together twice without touching
thrust hips backwards in time to pulses

then swing fists behind hips
pulse together twice without touching
thrust hips forward in time to pulses

like I wrote words upending scholarly worlds
“I’m a rockstar, Baby” I belt shamelessly
cheeks-flushed triumphant adjacent to the light

Tempered then laminated to prevent cutting edges

Photo by Artyom Kulakov from Pexels

 

Tempered then laminated to prevent cutting edges

ASSHOLE.  WHY DON’T YOU STEP OUT?

I had been walking off work

Now I’m assessing anger ahead

It is 4:45pm, and the sun has already set

I can’t tell the driver’s gender or ethnicity

I can tell the car’s color and make

Gleaming Blue Honda

YOU’RE PARKED ON THE SIDEWALK, ASSHOLE

Gray whiskers add to bristle he’s emitting

With black stocking cap/canvas jacket/work pants bellow

When he stalks around the car, I see the silver laptop

secure in front pocket of his black backpack

Hospital IT hiking to commuter lot, I guess

I’M TRYING TO WALK HERE

I slow so his indignation can carry him away

The driver turns left into a traffic break

The bellicose turns right churning uphill

I veer through parking lot the car exited

Defensive maneuver to avoid colliding

we’ve worsened from Impatient to Vitriolic

from the Latin vitriolum meaning Small Glass

the way windshields are designed to shatter

I’d like to social engineer the emotional equivalent

Safety features breaking raging into harmless pebbles

Everybody surviving collision

slightly bruised     exchanging information

Ode to 42 Spanish Street

photo by Jessie Preza

 

I want to travel to St. Augustine to sit in the courtyard of 42 Spanish Street.  I want to revel in the rescue of this two-hundred-year-old Colonial, restored by Hollingsworth with the help of his partner Zachary and that of his father Buzz (a fire hydrant of a man).  I want to sit in the chairs Worth and Zach picked out, enjoy the tang of the lemon tree they planted, listen to the cheerful burble of the fountain they resurrected, and register the rumble of the Florida masses they distress on the other side of the wall that divides us.  

(Inspired by "In with the Old," Season 3, Episode 6, 42 Spanish Street)

Every Cloud Has A Plastic Lining

Photograph: Toru Hanai/Reuters

Plastic falls in drops

Plastic soaks in soil

Plastic grows in grain

Plastic in our blood

Plastic in our membranes

Plastic in our sperm

Plastic in our embryos

Plastic in our lungs

Our bodies shall never break down

Shall be Pharaoh-like preserved

Entombed in our plastic dynasties 

As enduring as drifting white bags

 

Extinction

  

I miss my dinosaurs

reptilian heads, necks 

stretched into horizontal lines

wings pressed against oblong bodies

legs jerked in Jurassic-Parkish dance of

Stutter Step ┃ Hard Halt ┃ Rough Resume 

an Anthropocene Gallimimus

lurching towards its goal

formerly the grass patch

grazing through seed castoffs

beneath the neighbor’s feeder

now abandoned due to an abundant acorn crop

they’ve no need to eat factory-produced

until the oaks perish

October Free Generative Writing Workshop. Laura Johnson instructor

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To learn more about the science of Fall colors visit the US Forest Service website