the glory daze

3 hour drive and
we finally
made it
and
i'm swallowing
friday
beer
after beer after
beer
cans piling up
in the recycling
bin
and all these friends
i've missed
for years
around me
drinking
beer
after beer after
beer
out to the deck
for a quick dip
in warm liquid
bathing in bubbles
rising around and
the toxic
intoxicant
floats to my head
and
back in the cabin
we swarm
in the kitchen
baking
and sizzling
pulling beer
after beer after
beer
from the fridge and
then i hear
singing
we become
our own idols
off key but
in pitch(er) --hah!
and
by sunday


repentant


shifting gear
into gear
leaving gravel
for pavement
log cabin to
apartment


life
lying
in wait


**
I dedicate this one to my honors friends--thanks for the weekend.  


-Lindy

Glass Flower

Glass Flower

for Nancy S. Robinson (1950-2009)

“Be careful with me;

I am fragile.”

A friend of mine

was an artist.

My favorite piece

she constructed out of

the fresh wreckage

of automobiles,

not yet swept away

by the street cleaners.

She would go every day

with her tiny broom

and dust pan

and sweep up the pieces

of shattered glass

into a large, clear bowl.

It took weeks.

She probably had the remnants

of forty car wrecks

before she could begin.


She sifted through the gravel

to unearth the glass.

The darkest was brown,

from window tinting, or dirt,

sometimes from blood stains–-

she used this glass

for the soil.

From the greenish variety,

just barely tinged--

like someone had whispered

the idea of color

into its ear–-

she fashioned a stem.

And from busted break lights

the petals emerged.

The flower’s center

was the thing that made it:

broken bits and pieces

of shattered side

and rear-view mirrors,

where a hundred thousand lives

had been reflected

before.

Out of the grime

and rocks

and twisted metal

left on busy streets

rose a thing of beauty–-


so elegant

and so delicate–-

that when the sunlight hit it,

the colors exploded

like dry lightning,

like a firework

suspended against the night.


And it was almost blinding,

the beauty

it became.

**

I have done several versions of this poem since Nancy died, in a car wreck, on November 18, 2009.  I am not 100% sure I am finished with it, but it's as close as I'm going to get for quite some time.  The lotus tattoo I am getting next month is partially inspired by Nancy, partially by the sculpture mentioned in this poem (which a male friend of mine actually made), and partially by a few other things I won't get into at the moment. 


I still have not finished my May prompts (two more left!) but I will get to them soon.  However, I have been working on this one, and I wanted to share it.

april 28 . Another Friday Night at the Bar

The bar is packed
like sardines, salty and undesirable
or like luggage, necessary
and aesthetically pleasing
but heavy 
and cumbersome.


The regulars aren't all here;
perhaps they have received
a moment of enlightenment--
or there is a new bar
opening downtown.


The beer line is like the cast
from Welcome Back Kotter
though they like to think themselves
much more distinguished,
and modern
of course.


And here I am
at the back of the line,
looking down this row
of characters I can't help but love
and pity
wondering what makes me
need to be
one of them.

april 27 . untitled haiku

Fingers massage scalp
tighten, release, run through hair,
exasperated.


**
Well, April is over, which means I have some catching up to do--but not as much as I expected to have.  I soldiered through April pretty well until the end.  Oh, well.  Sometimes priorities shift, and that's that.  Here goes catching up . . .and yes, that means resorting to haiku.