Fear and greed migrate
Cuts a burn path ‘cross land
point blame at blameless
Burning hate migrates
No history lesson learned
decade to decade
Did all Gods migrate?
leaving us to destruction
in abandonment?
still quiet, breath stops a moment-- striations apparent upon the red rock in the distance-- sound unheard speaks a language our ancestors once knew-- perhaps our souls once spoke words lost to us now yet here where clouds paint shadows upon the land our souls feel the rhythm of a language we once knew
Strong, the breeze this evening
bringing the scent of grilling burgers
from a distant neighbor’s yard.
The sounds of soft sighs issue
from the dogs at my side.
The hummingbirds perform
an elegant ballet concerning
territorial claims as the symphony
of their brilliant buzzing
makes us all look up.
Stillness—
Then—
A rumble in the distance.
The scent of rain at war
with the scent of grilling burgers
from the neighbor’s yard.
The drops of rain pelt,
driving away
the smell of grilled meat.
Now, only the scent of rain remains.
The battle won.
Protected under the patio cover,
The dogs and I sigh.
The old washboard
stands in a five dollar flea market tub
with three faded, scratched up tall coke bottles,
a rusted plaid patterned lunch pail,
a red plastic mesh bag filled with used beach toys,
a broken hobby horse some kid rode once
while yelling, Hi, Ho, Silver! Away!
Among this disregarded dusty junk,
the old washboard looks fragile
as if the wood surrounding the corrugated steel
might fracture should a woman grasp it
intending to use it to scrub stains
from familial laundry
like my mother did with her’s.
I remember my mother’s washboard
standing in her soaking bucket,
filled with 20 Mule Team Borax, Biz, and hot water,
which stood in the concrete laundry tubs
in the basement of the house.
I remember how her knuckles turned red,
the skin raw looking, as she scrubbed blood
from a blouse, pouring salt from a Morton’s
salt container onto the stain then scrubbing
up and down, up and down on the washboard,
then dunking the blouse twice
to see if the stain was gone.
Pour, scrub, scrub, dunk, dunk
pour, scrub, scrub, dunk, dunk
pour, scrub, scrub, dunk, dunk
The pattern, the rhythm, until the stain erased.
I have no soaking bucket,
no Twenty Mule Team Borax, no Biz,
no washboard
to get my stains out.
My spray bottle of Oxi Clean Stain Remover
pales in memory
of my mother’s washboard.
the coolness of morning enters
it drifts into the veins
chills feeling for a time—
when the hummingbird perches
to drink the fresh sugar water
I made for her that morning,
I smile.
I grasp this beast of kinky
curls that sits upon my head,
attempting to tame it into submission.
First, the wire brush stretching strands
straight as concentrated hot air
dry the water from the beast.
Slowly the taming comes.
Finally dry, frizz left there,
making me aware who the boss really is.
I break out my next weapon
against this frizzy beast:
The flat iron.
And while it heats,
I tune the speakers to a podcast
about the missing women of Juarez.
Sectioning my beast hair as I listen
about women missing,
women found dead,
women to whom no one paid attention
because
they were
women, girls
because
they were
brown
because
they were
poor
women, girls
brown
poor—
The things
that do not grab attention
that fade away in the media
easy to say of these—
They ran away.
They ran away with a boyfriend.
Oh, she’s a drug addict. Who knows where she went?
And on I go to straighten another section
Of hair with my hot flat iron.
My beast neatly tamed.
I think it would be easier to braid my hair into rows.
Decorating the braids with small beads,
a bead for each missing woman,
a bead for each murdered woman,
a bead for each missing, murdered, indigenous woman of color
in this land, across the globe.
Each tiny bead
with a name microscopically etched
and then braided into my hair
as beads of grief,
a bead for each woman, each girl—
If I could then even lift
my bead heavy head
like the mothers who carry
sandbags of grief searching
the world for daughters
gone missing—
what could I, one person, do?
The world spins on.
Despite the burden of beads,
these beads braided
into the fabric of motherhood
across the globe
for girls gone missing,
girls glanced at, ignored
by a society that sends up invisible prayers
then turns forgetting what it deems valueless,
girls marked by the violence of poverty,
Then I think of 22 year old, Mahsa Amini.
dead in the twisted irony
of morality police custody for a hijab violation.
I should shave my head in solidarity
with the women of Iran
who protest.
But what could I, one person, do?
Would beads or a shaved head here make a difference?
Would anyone know the meaning?
My neck cannot bear the weight of braids with beads enough for each woman.
My bald head would not be understood as sign of solidarity.
So I send out my chicken scratches of a poem
into the world, and I choose to leave it as it is,
Untamed and ugly.
Women, we are tortured by our hair.
It is never what we want.
It never obeys our desires.
A mischievous heathen,
it laughs at our attempts
to bend it to our will.
We grow it, cut it, dye it,
curl it, straighten it,
treat it with carcinogenic chemicals
to beat the mischief making
blasphemer into submission.
All the while, it laughs at us
as our enemies, humidity and wind,
destroy in seconds the cooperation
we thought we’d earned
with our torturous machinations.
Hair:
Too thin,
Too thick,
Too curly,
Too unruly,
Too straight,
Too limp,
Too frizzy,
And the color—
Too…too…too…too-too little
and too-too much of everything—
Never exactly as it should be.
It will not follow our will.
Pull it into a ponytail.
Shove it under a baseball cap or a sun hat.
Why don’t we just shave our heads
And let it be done?
This woman’s crowning glory,
a temptation enough to make angels fall
from the heights of heaven at the sight it,
necessitates head coverings and wigs for women,
according to some.
After all, who wants it to rain angels
into the streets of the world?
That’s a sight I wouldn’t mind seeing
since I’ve got questions for those angels.
For one, why do women have to help angels
control such lusty impulses?
But I digress as I begin my morning battle
with my own head of hair.
April,
spring,
green,
a time of renewal,
life begins, grows,
days warm,
April, the month of poetry,
inspiration to be found
watching nature as she yawns,
stretches, rubs the winter’s sleep
from eyes closed against the cold—
Then why am I cold still
this April morning
as i sit
and sip
coffee
this fine sun warmed
April morning—
It is—
The three children of Covenant school,
The nineteen children of Robb Elementary,
The children,
The children—
All the children who knew terror
in the final moments of life.
All the children who live
now knowing the horror
of seeing classmates, bloodied, dead and dying
on the floor of a classroom.
This warm sun heralds spring’s return,
life’s renewal, the earth’s promise,
yet I can find no warmth.
washed clean
in orange sunsets
drenched by
lavender sunrises
so the dust
and the grime
can no longer
cling inside or out
of a me
freed, freed
of all of you
I am the prism
of beauty
I always was
yet never was
with you
As a child,
I survived the explosion of dreams
that left hot greasy remnants
dripping down the four-inch squares
of avocado green ceramic tiles,
marring their mirror like shine.
As a grown woman,
I survived the eruption of dreams
that poured down an encasement of hot ash
over all of life’s plans in the moment of diagnosis,
leaving monumental statues of grief.
Thus, I chose to live
where silence drones,
a rumble in the ears.
Nothing left--
a hole, a void
made by echoes
of desires held long ago.
So, I have taken a corn broom
to dance with me
in time to music
only I can hear
to sweep away the dust, the cobwebs,
the fuss of other’s opinions and ideas
of me, my doings, my words.
Yes, from my words,
I shake loose all the years of dust,
the years of ash, the years of grease.
All words, oh, so many words
I never loosed upon the air
to float free upon the winds,
tumbling away, up, around,
then returning once more
to spring up as wildflowers
when things turn to green.
I begin to loose them now,
freed to scatter where they will,
root, spring up where they
find a place to rest.
Poetry by Trisha Leigh
Because Sound Bytes Are Stupid
My Beautiful Chaotic Life
A Journey of Spiritual Significance
Traveling the great passage of life - Art in nature and writing
~ Communicator, WordSmith, Artist, Guide, Mentor, Muse ~
Where writers gather
Atmospheric Mind Flow
Driveling twaddle by an old flapdoodle.
stories, poems and more
May the Words Flow
Poets lie all the time but there are some truths only poetry can tell.
Now we see through a glass, darkly
The Writer
Just a small town girl who writes about Christian stuff.
Musings on life, love, and healing past trauma
Sharing Poetry and Hugs
Poems, Ramblings and Photography
KL CALEY
Inspiration and Spirituality **Award Free**
Growing with gratitude for life's challenges
A dose of fetish. Good friends. An incomparable muse.
These are my inner thoughts, passions and inspirations.
An insight to a heart mind and soul.
An onion has many layers. So have I!
To participate in the Ragtag Daily Prompt, create a Pingback to your post, or copy and paste the link to your post into the comments. And while you’re there, why not check out some of the other posts too!
Alternative haven for the Daily Post's mourners!
A curated webspace for Poetry, Politics, and Nature. Over 20,000 daily subscribers, 7,000 archived posts, 73 million hits and 5 million visitors.
Echoes of Life, Love and Laughter
Poetry
Showcasing the best of short films and screenplays from the LGBTQ+ community. Screenplay Winner every single month performed by professional actors. Film Festival occurs 21 times a year!
A Discovery of Enlightening Insights, Information, Humor, Writings and Musings
Artist by choice, photographer by default, poet by accident.
Premium Poetry Page Peskily Pondered Profoundly
Doing the best I can to keep it on the bright side
An Old Plumber, An Ex-Carer, An Amateur Poet, Words From The Heart
A storyteller with a poetic heart
...poetry, stories & rants.
Stephen Fuller *** Poetry, Essays
Poetry by Devon Brock
by Lize Bard
Experiments in Creative Writing, and more ....
Author Aspiring
Hearing The Mermaids Sing 