Jagged

Written in response to:

https://onewomansquest.org/2020/05/11/vjs-weekly-challenge-95-bits-and-pieces/

Pieces broke away,
pebbles and stones
chipped from a boulder.
The edge of a pane of glass
broken off, no longer smoothly square,
but rough ridged like a broken thumb nail,
begging to be filed away.

Pieces broken away,
missing in wordlessness,
cannot be found.
Jig saw together the rest,
glue, duct tape,
what is left,
never to imitate new, unbroken.

Broken, hollowed parts,
make for an ever incomplete,
an always abyss
to fall headlong into,
always a scratchy roughness to scrape
a knee, an elbow, a hand.
Always a sharp edge to slice open
an abdomen, an arm, a femoral artery, a throat.

No. No. No.
Everything, everything
at once, best kept at arm’s length.
Never can such wounds be allowed
in the here,
in the now.

Where the Heart Is

Image from the openingbelle.com
Written in response to https://sammiscribbles.wordpress.com/2020/05/09/weekend-writing-prompt-156-home/

Isn’t home where the heart is?
Or where you hang your hat?

My heart, well, I don’t know.
I seem to have misplaced it
Somewhere along the way.
I think I just mistreated it
And it decided to run away.

Didn’t treat it tenderly–
Let it get bruised,
Broken, bashed about.
So, it up and decided
It was time to go.
It bought a one-way ticket
On a now defunct airline
And went to catch the sun
On some tropical beach.

But that’s what happens
When you carelessly
Fling your heart around.
It develops shadows,
Misses beats,
Valves leak.
Then it gets pissed off,
runs away,
and home isn’t
what it
used to be.

Tapestry of Spirit

my mother

In her grandchildren,
her spirit is woven–
What a tapestry
These children create.

The strongest fibers
of her determination run
In the eldest, wearing her grandmother’s face,
Though she never knew her.

Threads of her courage and strength
Weave into the only one who knew her,
Who can remember the smell of her beef stew,
As the grown child wages a battle for her life.

Yarns of responsibility and fun spin
In the lone grandson,
As he raises his son
And forgets not how to play.

The delicate fine threads of her caring and her dreams
Spin through the twins,
Born too late to know her,
One doing what must be done
to care for others.
the other creating a business of her art.


The warm, soft yarn of her love and generosity
weaves through the youngest, my daughter,
Born under the same December sun,
As she becomes a nurse caring
For babies born too early.

In my mother’s grandchildren,
A tapestry of faith is woven,
And I am taught
DNA is more than science,
Woven with soul upon
Some ancient loom.
This tapestry of spirit
Where my mother lives still.

Sweeter Morning

image courtesy of The View from Great Island

Warm now on the edge of summer.

Still, I shiver gathering coffee to my lips.

I war with the craving for a cigarette.

When I take the morning deep into my chest,

The air lacks nicotine.

Years since I kicked that habit,

Yet some mornings it does seem

Nothing could be finer

Than caffeine and nicotine—

But it would not be you and me

Starting our day outside on the covered patio,

Watching for butterflies,

Drinking our coffee and smoking our cigarettes,

Dreams drifting in clouds of nicotine and steam.

flowering

image courtesy of Getty images

Walk to the end of dark uncurling days
at the edge of the earth,
witness it split open
flowering,
beautiful.
I’d give it to you
could it be contained
boxed, bottled,
held within my hands,
weak as they are,
that cannot hold
such flowering strength.

Fine tune

Tuning Fork in Water #1 courtesy of KaroAntonyan
Written in response to Weekend Writing Prompt #155 
“Tune”
This weekend your challenge is to write a poem or piece of prose in exactly 10 words.
Sammiscribble.wordpress.com

Use a tuning fork,

Fine tune this old tone-deaf heart.

Dream of Dancing

Tango by Noonsp on DeviantArt

https://amanpan.com/2020/04/27/eugis-weekly-prompt-dancing-april-27-2020/

I dream of dancing–
Intricacies of Argentina,
Ebb and flow–
Grace of Vienna,
Lift and swirl
Through shifting scenarios.

I wake.
Dancing ends.
Truly, I did dance once.
So many years ago.
Steps, lifts, patterns
Long forgotten.
I tried and tried to learn
That Texas Two Step.
Quick, quick, slow, slow—
They said.
But some inject a little extra step,
A tiny pause here or there.
I stand accused of trying to lead
When I should have followed.
My pointy boots, often in the way,
Did nothing to protect my feet.
And if you must know,
This last try crushed
My instep and toes.
I’ve just started to walk again.
So dancing, my friend?


I believe my dancing days are at an end.
So, do not ask me to try again
When I stumble and fall
Just walking and talking.
Dancing, a longed-for energy,
I no longer possess.

I may want, I may dream.
But I cannot chance
The crushing of another’s feet
In my bumbling, stumbling attempts–
To dance once again
The passionate closed embrace
Caricias and lustrada footwork
Of Argentina,
Or the sweeping flow
Of canter time pivot turns
And fleckerls and contra check
in the grace of Vienna.
So, no tango, no waltz.
And this old dog
Has proven she is just too old
To learn any new tricks
Of dancing.
Let this old dog sleep
And dream
And remember
What once it was like
To dance
With such
Passionate, graceful
Abandon.

Sharing Our Truths: Arrival of Spring – M.A. Morris

I am honored to be featured on BraveandReckless.com

braveandrecklessblog's avatarBrave & Reckless

Spring arrived
Barely seen.
Our eyes turned inward.
Suspicious of air,
We could not take spring
Deeply into our lungs,
Feel the warmth of it on our skin,
Taste the freshness of it on our tongues
For fear.

We counted our first born
And tried prayer.
Had we forgotten the blood of the lamb
Above the lintel?

We sought protection in distance,
longing for human touch.
Hate and fear drained us.
We grew weary hearing–
Wash your hands
Don’t touch your face
Wash your hands
Prayed Mother Mary full of grace
Six to ten feet apart we must stand
We feared to touch
Our mothers
Our fathers
Our sisters
Our brothers
Our sons
Our daughters
And longed–
All the more–
For touch.

Yes, this will make us aware—
Appreciate what now
We could not do.
Yes, we would improve,
We would appreciate all.
Technology would see us through.

Somewhere in…

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The Blanket

Image courtesy of Elftown.com

Written in response to Sammiscribble.Wordpress.com Weekend Writing Prompt #154- Use the word “Fabric” and no more than 131 words

A tiny explosion within the diagnosis:

Stage 3C ovarian cancer,

Blasts a hole in our family fabric.

Threads of surgeries and chemo

Stitch it shut.

A hard-knotted mess left.

We live without holes a few months.

 

New scans, blood tests.

Cancer slices a nice size gash,

fraying at the edges.

More chemo knits shut our fabric, 

No longer perfect with knots, scarred seams,

But whole.

 

Six months,

A rending– bowel resection,

Rips– chemo for a bit,

You stopped, couldn’t do anymore.

The rips, the tears—too many

Too many damaged places to repair.

We learn to live with holes, rips

Fraying tears, worn places—

Until you are no longer there,

Until there is no us—but the child and me,

And no blanket left to cover

What was left of us.

 

The Perfect Legend

image courtesy of windowtoparadise.com

Written in response to Eugi’s Weekly Prompt-

“Legend”- April 20, 2020

The day you left,

You became a legend

In the child’s heart.

True, she was a woman/child

By that time, but you—

Dying too young,

You became a legend,

Crafted to perfection

In her child’s heart.

Her memory forging steel

Fiction tales of your deeds

With iron ore dust of truth.

And I became the villain,

Who had neither the words,

The charms, the incantations

For healing to whisper

Over your body,

Nor had I the spells

To cast so you would live.

Thus, I was guilty of crimes against

Humanity in the book where she kept

A record of all my misdeeds, sins, crimes.

And now, she is grown.

A woman now and she finds

I am just a little less guilty,

Not so much the criminal,

In the present.

But you,

You will always be

The perfect legend.