Things Left Behind

This house is filled with memories...
Fragments to sift through.
A grey, felt hat,
Some brown, leather loafers.
I will keep the string tie
And the letter opener.
(They have my birthstone.)

Yet over the years
You gave me what
You wanted me to keep:
The jewelry box,
The clock,
The family pictures,
The old letters,
The mission style bureau,
The three porcelain bowls.

This house is filled with memories...
Yesterday long and quiet;
A raised eyebrow the only acknowledgement
That you knew we were there.
And years ago
The long van ride,
Sweet onions,
And the roses in your yard.

Yet over the years
You gave me what
You wanted me to keep:
Stories attached to items,
Notes tucked into a corner,
All the generations stretching
Across the water to England...
Wishing to hold onto something,
I will let the rest go.

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Where the light speckled ground is strewn with tiny, white flowers,
Where last season's leaves smell moist and cool,
Where the shadowed creek races with foam and debris
Between wet banks covered in moss and fern,
Where the sunshine kisses the tip of each brown twig
Spring peeps out from a bulging sassafrass bud.

New Snow (another exercise from chapter 7)

The beautiful, soft, feather-powder of snow
sifts lazily down
and the ground glows white
under the gaze of the full moon.
The naked trees are slipping long, white garments
along their branches;
and everything is so still, so quiet
I can almost hear the hiss of snow
sizzling out on your cheeks-
looking like tears.

Five Poemlets on New Snow (an exercise from chapter 7)

1
Lights twinkle through the window
casting colored glitter
onto the newly fallen snow.

2
The trees nod their heads wearily
weighted with the cares
of newly fallen snow.

3
Low sky glows pink with farm lights.
The night world is soft with new snow.

4
The cold kisses of the sky
sizzle away on your cheeks
looking like tears.

5
The silence is immense and soft;
is the world sleeping
beneath this blanket of new snow?

First Freeze

The ice this morning reminds me
of everything I meant to do:

The bed of strawberries, leaves frozen, ground frozen,
crying silently for a cover of straw.

The garden hose coiled neatly; a snake of ice.

The cannas bulbs undug
waiting patiently beneath stiffly frozen stalks.

Those potted plants,
drenched by the last rain,
anchored in place on the porch step.

Their immovable solidness a mockery
of all my good intentions.

People I Have Disapointed

K. who said: "Keep that hairbrush so you won't forget me."

M. who probably still wishes I would perm my hair and not wear jeans with holes in the knees.

A. with whom I sat up most of the night, wrapped in a thin robe, trying to talk through a misunderstanding.

The curly haired guy whose name I can't remember. He called me collect and I didn't accept the charges.

A. who said: "I don't want to come and visit you. Things will just be different and I'll be mad."

H. who wanted to be my boyfriend in grade school.

L. whose tears streamed down her face when it was time to go.

D. because I said, "I'm sorry, this won't work out."

A. because I never said "I'm sorry, this won't work out."

M. who truly believes my soul is in peril.

A. who wanted me to care more than I could.

Random Memories

Earliest memory: following a man with a shiny, bald head down the hallway of what would be our new home. I was two years old.

Around three, I collected roly-poly bugs with my neighbor, John, and tried to sell them to passers-by on the street.

Also at three: we moved to the country. I remember walking through grass higher than my head.

At twenty two I got married to my closest friend.

At ten, my family moved to a different state to make a new start.

At eight, Daniel always chose me to be Daisy when we played The Dukes of Hazard at recess.

At nine, I ignored Jeff when he called for help after a bike wreck (I never knew why I did this.)

At thirty four, I am happy to find a field of grass growing higher than my head.

At seventeen, I got a horse on Christmas day. At the time I thought it was the best gift ever.