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And Words Are All I Have
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I used to love September, but now it just rhymes with remember.
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September's Particular Sadness
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Micro-poetry, a longtime passion... I write it on any subject that catches my eye and ear. Right now my thoughts are seasonally-driven, with the advent of Labour Day. Even its name is cautionary...
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I like the power a micro poem can wield. How, by the very nature and limitations of its form, it can deliver more to the reader than often longer verses do.
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Shorter seems easier. But it turns out not to be true.
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Micro poems demands this of the writer: Say it clearly. Say it fast. The End.
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Boats pulled out for the season,
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Children back home, their minds on school,
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And like a switch was flipped overnight,
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The water in the lake looks darker,
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Obligatory backpacks bought, duotangs and
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the cornucopia of Sharpies,
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Heralding the dull march back to classrooms,
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Schedules. School nights.
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In its forlorn wake a trail of unhurried do nothing days,
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Letting the season take us.
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Lying utterly still on the sun-scorched dock
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Until perhaps deciding to reach down to the water to
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The communal deck
habitually sun-drenched
now slick and wet,
perfectly still.
Six Adirondack chairs,
their cedar slats slick with rain,
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in saturated color,
lined up in a precise and silent row
waiting.
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in the leaf of the phlox.
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Funny word for the quietest day of the year.
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It’s time to be adults again.
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No more ice cream for dinner,
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Unending Scrabble games, meandering conversations,
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late nights of poker and bad movies,
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It's time to be adults again.
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Summer, our permissive parent,
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Waits for us until next year
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Outside the classroom door,
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In its sun splashed and glorious wake.
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The geese heading south
emit unearthly,
discordant sounds
overhead,
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I wrote this poem years ago the day we sold a beloved cottage. I drafted it in the car on the way home and it came very easily; few do. I read it now and am catapulted back there, to indelible moments on a dusty drive home one long-ago September day.
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Goodbyes Mostly These Days.
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The family of loons rarely seen all summer
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now suddenly patrols the dock,
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the slightest bit interested
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The chipmunks will wonder,
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where their nightly trove of peanuts has gone.
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Grover the groundhog will sigh,
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at the prospect of having to charm new owners
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The loyal pair of cardinals will search for us in vain
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on their routine nightly visit
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and decree their human companions
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Taking our leave in the late afternoon,
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the dirt road will unspool dustily behind us,
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and we may miss a glimpse of the new fawn
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who pops her head out from the brush,
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puzzled seeing anyone take leave
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Mother fast-friended Daddy’s distant pool cousins
So to be sure we could swim
In their inground kidney with a corkscrew
Slide we bit our tongues as mother jerked
Orange floaties up to our throats
And yanked our hair under latex blossoms
We kicked and screamed and held
Our breath with arms over our ears
As they roared kick/jump/keep your mouth shut
While Daddy’s-Mama’s-Brother’s-Girl
Smoked menthols on a chaise
In a gold bandeau drinking
Gin after gin after gin
Because, Mother said, once upon a time
She was a beauty queen before
She had a boy with sugar they called ‘Tink’
And Katrina with gold skin
And gold hair and gold ankle
Bracelets (a trophy come to life)
Who sometimes showed up
With a long-haired/shirtless/round-shouldered boy
To pick-up a few bucks
While I snuck into the house
To use the drowning-in-pink
Bathroom that was inside
Daddy’s-Mama’s-Brother’s-Girl’s bedroom
To sit at her wicker vanity wondering
Why the sun made my skin red not gold
To clip on earrings that hung
Like bunches of purple grapes
Before sloshing out the sliding doors
Connecting the bedroom to the slab patio
Right beside the pool
Convinced Daddy’s favorite Frank Sinatra’s
Bedroom must be just like this
Until Mother announced it was getting late
Until we packed into our green Pontiac
Until Mother, as heavy as the wet towels
She piled in my arms
Told me to put ’em up
Until I pinned each towel
Until all the corners touched
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My favourite poem is the one that starts 'Thirty days hath September'
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because it actually tells you something.
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Recent Post
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The test results we await from teachers and doctors are neither good or bad - yet. But we give that time away in worry, the between time. The tent posts of our lives, ever the attention whores, the limelight stealers. But it should count for something. The dense weighty bud of the peony, its tight, shy secrecy before its brazen …
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Book Sales
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The Music of Leaving, my collection of poetry, is available to order.
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Order directly online — for both Canada and U.S. orders — from Amazon, Brunswick and Demeter.
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