Valleys

And there you were
in early morning hours;
my birthday
carried you over
cold and wet
under a manmade sun.
For a brief moment
you were my fate
yet I was suspended
retarded
encapsulated
in the mirror a foot away;
I saw myself
a violet water droplet
fixed in oil,
floating between worlds,
vivid lava waiting to erupt
with a word of permission,
just a word.
I held on for dear life
waiting
and watching you breathe
the day you were
and were not
mine.
5-21-06

A surprise ending
finds a fluffy pink tumor growing
where no child ever will again.
I nurse my condition
in hours in bed,
spiraling flesh in layers,
protecting my innards,
culturing my pearl...
nothing does anything
to take away the breaking heart.
So I will stand a statue again
in the garden of good and evil
holding out my heaven-stretched hands
while time stops and yellow lillies bloom around me,
grass grows over the edges of my feet,
and you become patina
for the soot-colored hours
of reanimation.
5-21-06

My last child
lay in her frilly bedbox
crowded by the enormity
of my smile.
Moments were ripe, delicious, unending.

Your last child
lay in her smart slatted cart
in a sea of space
left by the short flat line
on my dumbstruck face.
Moments were stolen,
the nazis always on the stairs.
5-21-06

Tell me next year will be better,
the smile at the party will be real,
the bathroom will not be occupied by my grief.
Tell me I will be sure and sewn together,
that I will have collected my tangled viscera from off the floor.
Tell me
that I'm ok,
that I really am ok,
that this is a woman's fleeting foolishness
and each day gets better from here.
5-21-06

In the belly of the whale...
I wake up and I'm viscid
from a concentrated slumber-
no fluids, no childrens' lives going on
no chores and cleaning
just sleep and unsupervised thinking
so the brick is on me;
barely a breath or a heartbeat.
I send puffs of desperation up
to the One Who knows me better
than I know myself
and loves me anyway
and walks with me when I stray.
Shame floods my face and neck-
too many miracle requests
and no more
and now more:
Your peace find me.
I tell my raining tears they will not cry
as demons fly at me with lances of lead thinking
and grace fends them off just long enough
for numbness to wave them away.
Noses to wipe,
floors to sweep...
our lives in His hands.
By noon my reflection
in the door of the microwave
mouths that I am
making it through one more day.
5-23-06

The dogwood whispered your name in lullabies
so I stripped her of her adorning song
and she is ugly now
without the ivory egg that fell
tripped by winds and mossy rotten branches.
She is ugly now
without the gleam
of her chiming metal earrings...
because she showed me my life
and I took her down a notch.
In her image of me my bough was broken,
my life no longer a beautiful dream.
We had a row;
I tussled and won
and would cut her down
but I know going too far.
And I know she was here
before me and all my problems
and will be long after.
5-24-06

A damp fire
fills my head with thick choking smoke,
piles on dry brush
and devil's rain.
The sun shines as tears fall;
they have their brief season,
enough to weave grey curtains,
to cover any ray of happiness or sanity.
I'm a gerbil in a wheel
clack clack clack;
there's no escaping-
the rat trap closes on my fractured half-beating heart.
I snap to
in a panic
in a rubber room.
I am on the brink
when a tiny sleeping hand falls on my mouth
a tiny fist with a tiny wet thumb,
balm of the ages,
salve for the soul;
peace be still.
The fire is out,
the curtain lifts,
sleep collapses in a heap
over my sick form.
I steal relief,
brief moments,
before the next wave.
5-28-06