loss

In the Long Ago So It Goes

~ Annette Kalandros ~ Leave a comment
image courtesy of istock

 

In the long ago

Youth’s armor

Stripping down fates

In acknowledgements

Of ruined selves

Where someplace we lost

The spare threads

To stitch everything back together

And could never touch another

As we once touched the other,

Letting go dreams

Sprinkled with desires

That only served to choke

The future we swallowed

In gulped decades

While watching dreams

Drift and float like the blown off

Heads of dandelions

Until settling into the

Drudgery of what must be done

In the day to day—

No answers exist when

The only answer is

There be no magic here,

No fairytales, no giants,

No forever’s or an eternity

Yet there be no lies,

No castles built on air,

No innocent beings with wings to rip away

In devilish delight,

No trust found broken

In garbage cans.

 

And so it goes.

 

And so it goes,

In essence,

Neither was what

The other really wanted

Resentments the wooden

Puzzle pieces of a child’s game

Tumbled down over us

In crushing weight

Until only the dust

Of us was left

To be swept away.

 

 

The Embroideress

~ Annette Kalandros ~ Leave a comment
Image courtesy of picClick
 
 

 

Like some ancient voodoo priestess,

Fears sits and smiles from her rocking chair.

Tilting her gray head to her work at hand,

Fear embroiders in red thread

The narratives of my old scars.

She stitches in orange and green thread

The flowers of my poorly made cobwebbed choices.

She stitches in black thread

The vanquished vines of  all my loss and pain.

She stitches in yellow thread

Her flowers of caution at the edges,

All the while chanting an ancient spell,

Giving her stitched yellow flowers

Magic to steal any power in the air,

Paralyzing– daring the pulse.

 

Fear stitches away in red thread

On the last cloth of daring I’ve left,

And I, I am paralyzed by the stitching made.

 

 

 

Dear Robert Frost

~ Annette Kalandros ~ 8 Comments
Image is my own. Taken at the Hockney/ Van Gogh exhibit

VJ’s Weekly Challenge: roads – One Woman’s Quest II (onewomansquest.org)

Before this moment,

All roads coalesced into one,

The present, the now.

Then,

Seeing this wall of roads,

I cannot help but ask

Where each road would have, could have

Led.

Different places, people–

Certainly, yes.

The mind swirls,

Possibilities,

A Tilt-A-Whirl—

A daughter lost?

The fetal tissue of a son not lost?

A different daughter born?

A heart not broken by cancer?

All the rewinds and fast forwards

Of a life of lived down different roads

Of different choices made along each way–

All the differences of each win and loss

And every other thing implied by this wall

And dear Robert Frost—

 

The choices I’ve made

Gave me this now,

This daughter,

For whom I would give my life,

Rather than trade.

Decision on a Birdfeeder

~ Annette Kalandros ~ 4 Comments
image courtesy of publicdomainpictures.net

 

I hesitate in remembrance

as if the fates would choose

a day of gray and leave me there,

as if a blossoming could be had upon

a second visitation to any day.

 

The creamer clouds disperse and swirl

in my extra strong coffee

like memories of things I wanted–

never had, never attained

all those years ago.

 

Stirring the coffee still,

I stare out the kitchen window.

Decide against a bird feeder

filled with black oil sunflower seeds.

I do not want cardinals here.

People say cardinals are spirits

of those you’ve lost come to visit you—

No.  I want no cardinals here.

No spirits of the lost to visit or say hello.

No twittering or chittering away.

No vibrancy of color outside this window.

No.  Not here.  Not in this place.

 

I’d rather this be a spiritless place,

A virgin place, void of spirits, void of touch—

 

At least for a time

 

 

 

Song of My Sisters

~ Annette Kalandros ~ 8 Comments
Image courtesy of Storytrender.com

A daily battle with memories,

Offering emptiness,

Even the sparkle of gem like happiness,

Leaving small smiles for the moment—

Before tears begin.

Standing separated

From the ashes and earth

We once kissed and touched so tenderly,

All we embrace now—air,

Some ephemeral being of memory

As voice and smile and laughter fade.

Some of us,

Too many, told too often,

By those once precious, counted family,

Our grief, less than, less meaningful,

Really nothing more than dust,

Containing no rawness of a bloody heart.

Thus, I voice, singing the lament

Of my sisters in widowhood,

As we wait for our souls to soar–

To take flight once again.

When each in her turn is ready,

Able to begin,

Renewed,

Emerging, uncurling, however slowly,

From our blanketing storm clouds of grief,

Wings wet, drying in the sun.

The Price

~ Annette Kalandros ~ Leave a comment
Image is my own

Weekend Writing Prompt #194 – Beguile | Sammi Cox (wordpress.com)

Wish I could rest beguiled–

Believing willingly in soft whispered lies

If only for this little while of rest

As if slipping easily between

The waxen petals of lilies

And curling round the sweetened smell

Of wonderous blossoming softness—

Yet the price, the price of choosing

The rest of such beguilement

 

Tiny One

~ Annette Kalandros ~ 3 Comments
for our foster dog who was a brave fighter

You wake this morning,

My Tiny One,

Your morning of sun and warmth,

Mine of damp, dense fog.

Yet, I know,

Know you’ve found them all,

The squirrel hunter,

The gentle soft one,

The lion-hearted protector,

And the human,

The human I told of,

Whose pockets contain

Tasty treats,

Who is a warrior, like you,

Tiny One, like you,

Whose body now whole,

No longer wasted at all,

Now strong.

This human can throw the ball

All day long for you,

And you, my Tiny One,

No longer standing on shaking, wobbly,

Wasted legs which seek to betray,

Can chase and chase and chase

That ball all day,

Returning it each time

To the human who

Like you, my Tiny One,

With battles fought and done,

With all the wars won,

Runs, runs free now, Tiny One. 

So now, my Tiny One,

All your battles done,

All your wars won,

Run, run free, Tiny One.