10 Minute Free Write: What Did Someone Kill?

My father killed the muskrat. The muskrat had been cornered by our dog Butchie. Butchie was barking, looking up at us, barking more, smiling at us. The raised shovel above my father's head threatened to fall on Butchie, but fell instead on the muskrat. I had no idea what a muskrat was. It came up from the creek, said my father. It was hiding behind the garbage cans, but it was only hiding. It was not trying to get into the garbage, it never had the chance. What does a muskrat do? Why did this one travel so far from home? What if it was friendly? I thought something so easily cornered and killed must have been friendly really. How afraid it must have felt, cowering in the corner behind the cans. It never stood a chance. My father picked it up by its tail and carried it to the communal burial pit in the back across the creek, the very pit Butchie would be laid to rest in years later. I looked away, averting my eyes from the gore I expected, averting my mind from the nothingness where once a muskrat had lived. I went back inside, sad and afraid, not knowing why the muskrat had to die. I went inside to find Gilligan and his friends waiting for me. The day my father killed the muskrat was the day I saw the depth of coldness in my father, the emptiness that kept him from appreciating the life of a small water-rodent that couldn't have harmed any of us, and wouldn't have stuck around to make mischief of our order. That was a bad day for the muskrat. The last thing he saw was the cold empty eyes of my father, shovel raised and ready for the death blow, killing without a thought for the young in the den, the errand unfinished, the mate left alone.

10 Minute Free Write: No One Asked

No one asked me how I felt about moving. My mother hopped up and down with glee when the call came from my father at work. We were leaving for a new country on a far continent. I was too young to know what any of it meant. I jumped up up down with my mother, caught in the net of her joy, a minnow. Swept in the emotion of the moment until I realized in one fast frown moving, going, means leaving, away from, I would be leaving all the I knew, my grandmother, my friends, my school, my back yard, my creek, my dog, leaving suddenly felt empty and as I landed from a hop I started to cry. The universe was opening up and swallowing me whole in its limitless emptiness. My mother stopped to hug me and reassure me that we would love it, that we would have a great life. This was my first experience of not knowing what to expect. That moment that hard wired me for all the next moments of newness -- now I always feel and fear the universe yawning and swallowing me, empty space pulls me apart in zero gravity, all that is large becomes tiny, all that is minuscule overwhelms. No one asked what I was thinking, no one asked what I felt. No one asked what I wanted or what might help me get through this. No one asked me if I needed a space ship for my journey, What I have striven to build for myself since that moment is a self-contained pod that can travel untouched through the vast reaches beyond what little I know, the small room that is my life into the hall of mirrors that always waits for me.

Halloween 2009, poem for the kids

Dark Shadow

Before the darkness came
my life was very usual
I went to school, I read my books,
I did what my parents told me.

But then one night, not long ago
My mother tucked me in
and kissed my cheek,
as many nights before.

She left the room, turned out the light
and waved, "See you in the morn!"

Just then I heard a muffled snap
and saw the closet door ajar.
I shook my head and blinked my eyes,
I swear a shadow moved inside.

The shadow slid across the floor
And out into the room
I heard my beat faster
my blood rushed through my veins.

The shadow reached across my bed
and covered up my feet.
My eyes got big, I couldn't blink,
as I watched it slowly creep.

I couldn't move, I watched instead
as the shadow crept up, crept up upon the bed
The darkness crept across my andles
up my shins, across my knees,
I felt it hold me down.

I felt the sweat upon my brow
the rest of me was cold
I knew that if I called my mom
she'd be there quick as that.
But I couldn't make a sound

The shadow now across my chest
was gripping at my heart.
I knew that if it reached my head
There'd be no me no more.

Against the fear I struggled.
Against the dark I fought.
Finally out of my mouth,
the tiniest of squawks.

Immediatly, it seemed,
as if she'd been there all along,
my mother popper into my room
and flipped the light switch on.

To my relief that moment
the shadow disappeared.
My legs could move, my arms were free
The danger, it seemed, had cleared.

My mother sat upon my bed,
her eyes were all concern.
She touched my face and rubbed my head
"You had a nightmare, son..."

No nightmare this, I thought,
no dream at all, but real.
And now I cannot go to sleep
Unless the closet door is sealed.

The Nestled Ear 11-5-09

The Nestled Ear

Finally in bed I wait for sleep.
Turning on my side my up hear: alert
My nestled ear is cozy, muffled
my nestled ear wants to dream,
meander into the haze between worlds.
My up ear perks to the presumed prowler
prying the front door
then, when the door never opens,
soothes and purrs to the drop and patter
of the cat jumping off his perch
and trotting up the stairs
soon all sounds spread to a buzzing silence
my nestled ear beckons to my watchful ear
"Relax.. it's all good... the bolt is shot,
the alarm is set."
Sleep whispers from across the room.

Untouched

Untouched

from here, under this tree, I watch the world

watching and wanting the world I see

leaning on this tree, feeling it under me

papery bark softens under my hand

peels away to bring in the newest of itself,

falls away to smooth.

Branches hug in lowering circles

snatch at the world they cannot hold

I am in it, I am in it, I am in it

the world holds me too

I fall away to smooth

am softened to belong

I am butter under the tree

melted from endless circles around

I am soaking into the ground.

the limbs lower their circles to clutch

I am held in my place

but not touched.

One of my favorite experiences

I went to a party tonight. Yes, that is one of my favorite things to do. I love people, and I love talking, and I love eating. That, my friends, is an excellent recipe for a party. I got to the party early, bringing ice and ready to lend a hand to the organizers. The house is near my previous abode, in one of my favorite neighborhoods in the world.

At one point I left behind the bustle of preparations to sit alone on the front step. The evening was warm, the air was still but not stagnant. the sun was down behind the trees, the air buzzed with fading light and last minute bees. Trees line the street, businesses and houses mingle on either side. A coffee shop, a clinic, 3 year old townhouses, 100 year old craftsman houses. A block away blues music sauntered out of a restaurant where diners were enjoying al fresco. Wait staff waltzed around with dishes and pitchers. Cars came and went on their busy secret missions. Bicycles peddle past.

There were no loud noises, just a constant hum of evening activity. People walked up and down the street. On one hand, I have lived in this area on and off for 20 years. On the other hand, there was something unfamiliar, almost foreign about this moment, as if I was in another city, another country, another life. It reminded me of life in the South, being an activist in Atlanta. It reminded me of Oakland. It reminded me of someplace I've never been. It felt so good.

One Hundred and Four

White cotton fixes on my heated skin
Holding itself to my damp shape
Sun arcs the sere sky
Moving from hot to hotter and back to hot
Splitting into the over and under of summer
Later days indistinguishable
Morning from evening
Sky the color of unwatered lawns

Cool is only found at the bottom
...of the pool, the deep end
...of the glass of iced tea
...of the dream in fitful sleep
...of the sheets under the ice packs
...of the freezer section in the store
Where no one looks alarmed as I bend
My ear to the icy edemame
The bag at the bottom of the freezer
is telling me how to stay cool.