A Word From the Wise

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My mother-in-law treasured words. Scrabble was her game. Precision, patience, strategy.  Tiles that scored both ways or landed on a triple made some sweet satisfaction. Sometimes points weren’t the point;  defensive play wins games while openings encourage neophytes and friends. When she spoke, a few words said it all. Most often she meant to be kind. An invitation, a suggestion, wise words, sometimes firm redirection, sharp, if necessary. 

She held onto words until the end. She gathered them slowly. It took time to retrieve them. They balked, hidden away from memory, supplemented by smiles and nods. The sentences were short. The meaning was clear.

Smoking on a Wet Evening

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You know the way it rains at night after the dogs been out. After everybody settles near the fireplace, shoes kicked off, feet warming. That kind of night when, like as not, a banshee’ll slip in through the cracks in the ceiling and make herself at home. 

Don’t disturb her. She’ll get loud, then. Nobody dies if she stays calm. Don’t be alarmed when she squats, knees up around her head, haunches down on the floor. Offer her a pipe. The one you’re smoking. It’s likely why she came. After a heavy drag, she’ll nod and disappear up the chimney.

Quince Blossoms on Bare Wood

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Quince flowers on a bare stick of a tree,
blooming in the dead of winter.
Coral colored buds against brown bark,
two elements, earth and water.

The blue aired sky, the fire orange sun. 
Air and sky and weft and warp.
The dogs sense a reckoning.
They raise their ears in a unified front with the four elements.

They yowl into song like actors in a musical.
At times like these, when winter seems eternal, when spirits flag,
when fear threatens to extinguish the elements of life,
we need a rousing score. A yellow brick road. A little dog, too.

Cash for Teeth

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“Guess what the going rate for teeth is,” Marjorie said.

“Uh, three dollars.” Angie thought that was an outrageous sum. She’d once got a quarter for a wisdom tooth from a boyfriend. A joke. The Tooth Fairy gave her a dime for each.

“Six and change.” Gotcha, her grin said.

“Oh, c’mon.” Angie thought Marjorie exaggerated to get attention.

But later, Angie ran across an item in News of the Weird. Six was the average. Some kids got a Benjamin for each tooth. She said to her mother, “You ripped me off.” Then she told her how.

Mom laughed. “Inflation.”

Dinosaurs

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The ankylosaurus strapped on his helmet and hopped on his bike. His tail swung from side to side, balancing him. He was about to become a fossil, though he had no idea that the asteroid would strike that afternoon. No one did. They were all worried about T-Rex. Terrified, in fact. Fear, uncertainty and doubt ruled.

Before Rex, it was something else. And something else. Something else to distract them. They reacted. They dodged to the left, to the right. They ducked and wove. Eventually, distractions took their toll.

Ankylosaurus felt himself wobble. He steered hard to the center. 

Tiny Hands

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The others dinosaurs laughed behind his back but not to his jaw dominated face. It was the jaw they avoided when T-Rex came after them. His hands were small, arms too short to reach, but he had a knack for swinging his head in a death arc while his mouth spewed rot. Avoid the rot, avoid the hands, run like hell. It’s a Hobbesian world.

It doesn’t help to run. Nor will a strongman, a dinosaur like T-Rex, solve the problem. Given the chance, dear Hobbes, a dictator will make life “nasty, brutish, and short,” for the rest of us.

A Moment, A Feeling

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There’s a moment when I think about a lonely alone in the future 
because life throws these things at you,
especially at our age.

Would that be okay?
Could I make it work?

No.  I would end up down infinite rabbit holes, an eternity of recursions, chasing Red Queens and Cheshire Cats, my own tail.
Not making sense.

Your presence anchors me in this time, this here and now present.
I depend on the steady chronology of your day-in, day-out goodness,
depend on the moments we intersect at intervals
to talk, to eat, to share a thought.

You ground me.

A Change of Spring

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Not windy as we thought it would be.
Light breeze spins a metal orb;
shelf fungus grows in a tree knot.

Spring, the first of many buds,
of many mushrooms, honey colored. They make the most of rain.
Draw it into gills that spore. The dogs sniff around, giddy.

Soon enough another front will come. We’ll hunker inside.
Soon enough a fierce February like last 
February when soil sogged and trees uprooted.

We live by the weather, uncertain what else might give way,
grateful the sun shines, for now.
Then watch the world move fast past points of no return.

Wishing Spring

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Until spring comes, Persephone will fill the Styx with tears of longing for her mother.
Caught in the prison of Hades’s grasping power, she mourns.
Caught in the devil of the season, we wish it done.

We cry for hope.
Hope that the dark sky opens. That sunlight shines on puddles and nourishes green shoots of grass. 
Grass like flying carpets.
Take us from this dark country, soar high on a hope and a prayer.

A hope that Persephone and Demeter will be united
in love of Mother Earth. Their garden will bloom again. 
A prayer for spring. For redemption.

Wishing on a Glass Slipper

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Cindy earned while her stepsisters played. Her stepmother said retail work builds character. And isolation. Cindy was the only one in the shoe store when a Ren Fair guy came in and asked for glass slippers.

“Like in fairy tale land? No. Never seen anything like that.”

“They carry you away. Wherever you want to go.”

“But I don’t think we have them.”

“Worth checking. Wish come true.”

Cindy found one pair, her size, on a dusty shelf. From thin air it appeared.

“You mean these?”

“Try them,” he said.

They were hard, slippery, “I can’t walk.”

“Wish,” he said.