Flash Mob 2013 *

Cautious Attraction

“Is that a canker sore on your lip?”
“No, it’s a wart.  Why do you ask?”
“No reason.”
“There has to be a reason.  Normally people look away.”
“Just wondering, that’s all.”
“Were you thinking about kissing me?”
“Kissing you?  Don’t be ridiculous!”
“You’re probably worried about STDs.”
“I was not worried about anything, I was concerned.  It must hurt.”
“Canker sores are not contagious.”
“I didn’t know that, but I really don’t care.”
“It’s the warts that can be transferred to other people.”
“You are a font of information about contagious conditions.”
“I thought it gave me a sensuous lip.”
“You ought to get it taken care of.”
“Actually, it’s just a canker sore.  Eventually it’ll go away.”
“Then why did you tell me it was a wart?”
“I wanted you to think I was a prince.”
“That’s the worst come-on line I’ve ever heard.”
“So kissing is out of the question?”
“Kissing was never a part of the question.”
“A handshake?”
“That’s my Parkinson’s.”

* http://flashmob2013.wordpress.com/the-contest-rules/

Weekly Worded

    In the Dark

The question remains
even after the birds have gone
softly to their nests,

will the old songs
still bring the sunrise?

Weekly Worded

    Blue

Just before she died, my mother’s feet
turned blue, a blue that meant her blood refused
to travel the length of her body.

Not the blue of pure starlight
arriving ten million years after its birth
nor the blue of oceans swelling with storm.

Just blue,
the shade that comes with a bruise.
I want to believe the tumor forced her

not to pay attention, that it replaced the part 
her brain destroyed, actually invented memories
to run like old films on a tiny screen,

so she had to watch very carefully, the projector
flickering in time with her heart, the theater
filled with blue light.

Weekly Worded

    Suite Country

1.

Trenching an irrigation line
with a shovel, I glanced up to find
most of the neighbor’s herd
crowding our fencerow.
The handle shaping a post
to lean against, I caught my breath,
lifted my cap, wiped sweat.
It was early afternoon. 
Cows at rest between meals,
nothing for them but this tableau,
man with tool, unearthing appetite.

2.

Moonlight blasts the bedspread white 
while I sleep.  It must be a dream,
packing the sheet like fresh snow
around every muscle that aches. 
Frogs in the bar ditch throbbing.

3.

All night the spade
left sunk to its hilt
in good earth,

handle sticking up
like a microphone boom
on an empty stage.

Weekly Worded

    Squall

          It’s raining mud,
          and the wind refuses
          to let raindrops
          reach the ground. 

          Windows darken
          with the paste,
          then dry to a sepia lace
          draped across the glass.

          Sunset throbs
          like a bruise,
          but how beautiful
          this savage spring.

Weekly Worded

    Warming Up

The lilacs want to start over so badly 

they arrange themselves like notes 

along a musical staff, each twig 

a conductor’s baton, half notes 

to the foot, the full orchestra 

renewed, tuning up in the sunlight. 

Already the daffodils are burning

like votives along the sidewalks,

forsythia rising like an old 

gold faithful, a bluebird

incandescent as a pilot light 

nesting so close to the house.

Weekly Worded

    Ghost Breast
      (for Pam)

Touching on this lump
you discovered in your breast,

when you first found it
it must have felt like playing

the wrong note on a keyboard,
like putting your big toe

into an infant’s shoe.
Or maybe it flickered like

a film, your interest waning
with each new threat of violence,

blood and gore.
Could it have been like the taste

of milk gone sour, or a crumbling
arch reduced to rubble,

or a hand you once held
before tenderness moved away?

I know, it’s only you
who has the sense

to give up trying
to describe what it’s like,

this life without comparison.