Poem: Deja Vu #the100dayproject Day 66

Deja Vu

You looked at the stars and knew them. 

You looked at me and knew me.

You looked at the earth and said 

“I’ve done this before in some other life.” 

You proceeded to remember the tangle of them 

as thorned blackberry brambles unraveling. 

You’ve done all of this before 

gathered your years and wrinkles 

and then they left you each time, 

always forgetting and remembering 

everything that you learned, 

but the weight of each life 

kept inside of you like a fist of flowers 

picked too soon that they can never  

quite fully bloom. 

Poem: Litter #the100dayproject Day 65

Here's day 65 of #the100dayproject

Litter 

I want to lie my spine down onto the grass one notch at a time 

let the grass prick my skin like a million needles 

let the bugs crawl on me. I cannot flinch. 

To flinch assumes I have a self. That I am separate. 

I want to have no self. I want to discard it 

like the fast food bag, the gum wrapper 

blowing in the wind beneath the oak tree. 

I am the garbage can turned over, left open to the wind. 

I am the pieces of shattered glass and the plastic bottle 

floating in the gutter. Each day I lose my buoyancy, 

I crumble into a finer dust. I am the refuse  

forgotten or thrown out. I am the paper disintegrating into the grass. 

My body takes its time, but I will return to the earth, 

piece by piece, bone by bone. I am nothing more 

than the newspapers moving like tumbleweeds in the wind. 

I am the hand that does the tossing, the tossing that shames the hand. 

Poem: Anti-Aging Cream #the100dayproject Day 63

Finally caught up...

Anti-Aging Cream

I could press myself into a book of wax 

like a rose petal or a red fallen leaf. 

Plucked, born into this world  

I could preserve myself a little longer.  

Yet my you would not last  

even the pressed flower is only half 

its newly budded self, 

rather it wilts and browns, 

its fragrance a shadow 

smells of earth and rot. 

Even its thorns have lost its cut. 

Poem: Considerations #the100dayproject Day 62

Catch up....

Considerations

Consider the curry,  

the tempered mustard seeds in oil,  

the dried chilies simmering with ginger. 

Consider the yogurt turned turmeric yellow  

mixed with beige besan flour. 

Consider the sizzled cumin seeds  

and broiled eggplants tossed  

with tomatoes and coriander. 

Consider the rice and the round rotis,  

the whistling pressure cooker angry with steam. 

Consider the puckering lemon squeezed over  

the whole pot of curry. 

Consider the wooden spoon that tastes 

every bit of food that cooks up 

with all of these skilled hands. 

Consider the salt pinched  

between all of these hands 

like a gift, a blessing 

to keep our bellies full, 

our mouths dancing with spice. 

Poem: An Eye For #the100dayproject Day 61

Playing catch up...

An Eye For

I write not as I draw, 

my eyes more accurate 

with the words I write than 

with the charcoal pencil 

that mirrors the world.