5 Word Prompt Poem for Claire

Spa Love Pineapples Chocolate Hugh

When Hugh said "We need to talk,"
In his thoughtful voice
The one he uses when
He thinks I might argue with him.
I stopped cutting the pineapple,
Put the knife down carefully,
Pushing the edge away,
Thinking about the three other
Pineapples patiently waiting
On the washboard,
And the people arriving soon
That Hugh had wanted to invite
And the chocolate still not sauced.
"Honey," he juts his chin as he pulls
his words out of his gut
"I'm not sure I love you anymore."
I'm not sure if her hears my sigh
"Of course you love me, dear. You've
Just forgotten how it feels."
I kiss his cheek and ruffle his hair.
He is so proud of his hair at his age.
I put the knife in his hand,
Holding his hand over the handle.
"Now chop the fruit for your friends,
They'll be here any minute."
Already I'm thinking
about the spa tomorrow,
To relieve his guilt with my pleasure.

Moon: a review

Well, this is more of a psalm than a review. I loved Moon. I loved everything about it. I loved it's mystery. I loved the pacing of the plot. I loved the low-tech special effects. Models and sets still got it, baby! CGI not required. I loved the music. I loved watching this movie after spending loads of time alone over the past few weeks. I loved the details of dirty entropy pock marking the sterile pristine space station, the coffee stained Gerty. I especially loved when a bloodied, feverish Sam was being carried, while he was not quite in his space suit and it looked like he had 4 arms and 4 legs...

This movie is what I've been waiting for. It's beautiful. Space, the moon, the station where Sam lives, it's all so beautiful. The funny thing is, we, the audience, have seen enough of space in movies to know how utterly silent it is. How would we deal with being alone in space for 3 years? How much effort does it take to maintain your humanity when you are alone in space? Clearly we measure our humanity by our relationships, even the most basic relationship of perceiving and being perceived gives us a sense of self. What interaction we can program into a computer is by definition limited. Watching Sam lose his humanity and regain it is a beautiful process.

Everything about this movie is what I yearn for in a film. It is so lovingly, meticulously crafted that it looks effortless.

Did I mention the music? I love the music. I love how the moon rocks being mindlessly digested by the Helium 3 mining machines cause the surface dust to billow.

I want to cuddle this movie. I want to hold it close, like a couple of highschool sweet hearts at their locker between classes. And when the bully Avatar walks by, we'll snicker and cut our eyes, and whisper, all the while knowing that what we have is so much better than anything Avatar has to offer, with all it's bling and gusto.

Winter Sun

Winter sun smirks
low across a mean sky
glints hard against the water
like glass on ice
reflects a fake, dancing warmth
off hard-edged buildings
marching along the bay.

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.