Those nights we fight, sitting on the hard
kitchen chairs, dinner bones still
piled on our plates, there should be marks,
sharp drops of blood matching
my teeth, ripped fur bits flung
beneath the table, evidence of hurt
among the crumbs.
That’s what I know how to do.
Throwing the diamond necklace
at the man who threw my jewelry box
at me, breaking it and then fixing it,
breaking it and then fixing it; I know
how to do that, to be broken
and fixed, broken and fixed.
How I admire my stitches.
To stand still
while this one fastens
a necklace of semi-precious stones
around my neck, how hard can it be
to bear kindness? His rose quartz,
moss agate, carnelian, tiger’s eye;
my hand presses them to my skin,
warming, keeping them.
Published in The Poeming Pigeon: A Literary Journal of Poetry, vo. 3 no. 2, 2017
After retiring from a column-writing gig lasting eleven years and yielding over 300 personal essays, I find I still have something to say. My thoughts range far and wide, and occasionally deep, on subjects including being an Iowan who misses Colorado; surviving marital violence; raising an amazing daughter and an equally amazing son; being justifiably angry about the world “these days;” writing poetry and plays; wondering if I’ll get Alzheimer’s like my mom and her two brothers; wanting to write about my twin granddaughters without sounding all Hallmark-y; fixing OCD-ish food; making sense of pants that come in shorts / crops / ankle-grazing / bootcut; being a librarian in public, academic, archival, and medical libraries; waiting 46 years to attend my high school reunion; having a gorgeous garden I can’t take care of; seeing a shaman; loving good men despite all the bad ones; and trying to wrest a little joy from life despite an 11-year-and-counting chronic migraine.