She stood with two feet barely
Balancing on the knobby, uneven roots
Of the maple skyscraper in her backyard
Her eyes drew a line
From trunk to tip
Where green fades into blue
So many branches,
And she’d never been very good
At making decisions
He offered his hand to help her
Up to the thick, stable branch just above her fingertips
“I can do it myself,” she countered.
But he said, “Yes you can,
But you don’t need to.”
................................................
Balancing on the knobby, uneven roots
Of the maple skyscraper in her backyard
Her eyes drew a line
From trunk to tip
Where green fades into blue
So many branches,
And she’d never been very good
At making decisions
He offered his hand to help her
Up to the thick, stable branch just above her fingertips
“I can do it myself,” she countered.
But he said, “Yes you can,
But you don’t need to.”
................................................
Twenty-Eight
She walked down the street
Not watching where she was walking
But who she was walking past.
Their faces told of birthdays and breakups,
Lost and found love,
A soundtrack to the pattern of their steps.
She looked at their eyes,
Curious if anyone wanted to know her story
But no one looked back
Then with a brush of his hand on hers
As he walked by
He whispered her name
And stopped.
Not watching where she was walking
But who she was walking past.
Their faces told of birthdays and breakups,
Lost and found love,
A soundtrack to the pattern of their steps.
She looked at their eyes,
Curious if anyone wanted to know her story
But no one looked back
Then with a brush of his hand on hers
As he walked by
He whispered her name
And stopped.
................................................
Seventy-Eight
Seventy-Eight
He laced his fingers through hers
As they took a walk
Down the hall with the white tile floors
And that smell that was too clean for the sickness it held.
She imagined they were barefoot on a beach
In Morocco
Forty-five years ago
After wearing an ivory dress and a gardenia in her hair
He tipped the driver of the rusty green cab
That had been their getaway car
And had carried her to the door
Of the quiet cabin that would be their castle
But that night,
When he lifted her onto a bed of clean white sheets
And crawled in beside her
They just slept
And that was enough.
{I wrote these for my creative writing class. I'm deciding that I really like poetry. Writing and reading it.}
As they took a walk
Down the hall with the white tile floors
And that smell that was too clean for the sickness it held.
She imagined they were barefoot on a beach
In Morocco
Forty-five years ago
After wearing an ivory dress and a gardenia in her hair
He tipped the driver of the rusty green cab
That had been their getaway car
And had carried her to the door
Of the quiet cabin that would be their castle
But that night,
When he lifted her onto a bed of clean white sheets
And crawled in beside her
They just slept
And that was enough.
{I wrote these for my creative writing class. I'm deciding that I really like poetry. Writing and reading it.}
