Drowning

Let me tell you what I know about

my broken heart

this is the rhythm of it falling apart

toss the stones in the river because

we are

we are coming up for air again

What did I even know about

guilt and sin

all of the dreams that

I was dying in

it was a curse it was a blessing it

was utter nothingness

until it skidded and came crashing

home

No telling how the earth will

record this disaster

whistling dixie in the wind

as if I had the answer

            ballet with fractured form

tripped up by vengeful rapture

the hammer flung against

the wall

Dismantled piece by piece into

a million parts

buried back with Santa at

the Christmas tree farm

what is dead is what is real to

the falling apart

we heard the siren but not the

alarm

I wonder how I will know when

the sky becomes my master

when dreams of yesterday stop

mocking me with laughter

tomorrow is today tornadoes

circling my trailer

I was wrong over

and over again

Now I whisper to the wind about

my broken heart

failing in slow motion

not a subtle art

toss the stones in the river because

I am

I am here alone at the end

Innocence

With a belligerent expression on his smug entitled face, Adam told me, “I love her."

“I’m sure you do.”

“Why are you so cynical?”

“I think realistic might be more apt," I replied.  I tried to get the bartender's attention, but he ignored me in favor of a trio of giggly college girls.  "You aren't the type to stick around."

“I’ve been with her for almost three years--long before you and her deadbeat father showed up on the scene.”

“I know,” I said, bored now with this conversation.  “Are you going to get the beer, or should I?”

“Dude, you’d better get used to me,” Adam snarled, “because I’m not going anywhere.”

“I guess that’s you volunteering, then,” I answered, and fighting back the urge to punch him, I returned to the table.  “Adam’s getting the beer,” I told Angie.  “He’ll be right back.”

“Great,” she said with a big smile.  But I didn’t care if she thought she loved him.  Soon enough his useless ass would be bouncing straight out the door.

Unprepared

                the place you fell down from

  was the air so pure up there

                                that before you could warn me I

might find you

                  in the rustling of the trees  

you lost your breath

                and I was trapped

             under this avalanche of 

leaves        

                               

Wisdom lost

And nothing is more obvious to
my existence than this raging
internal war,
who is fighting and who is winning,
irrelevant so far.

Misplaced

Dream Journal, February 2, 2005

Had a dream that I went with two people to my grandparents’ house.  The house was empty; we were just checking up on it.  Everyone who lived there had disappeared, except for my grandfather, who we knew had died.  Although the door to the living room was supposed to be closed, a little dog with us ran out of the room and down to the basement.  We went to the basement door and called for the dog.  As he came back up the stairs, a young woman followed him.

Well, I nearly had a heart attack.  She had been one of the missing people we’d assumed was dead--other than that I didn’t know exactly who she was.  I asked her where she’d been. She said she didn’t know, only that she'd been gone for three years.  Whoever had taken her had arranged for her life upon her return.  She had a strange air of contentment about the fact that she’d lost three years of her life.

She told us she intended to stay in the house.  I was scared and I wanted to leave, so she told me to call her whenever I needed her, which didn’t seem very likely.  Other people were staying with her at the house, although I could just see some shadows hovering around her. 

Only then did I realize that everyone who had disappeared were members of my family, not just random people.  Terror overcame me that whoever was taking them would come for me, too, and I didn’t want that.  I didn’t want to disappear and not know what happened to me for such a long stretch of time. 

When I woke up it was the middle of the night and I felt very, very afraid.  I thought to myself that maybe I didn’t want to remember after all.  I didn’t feel so brave anymore.

After that I had another dream.  In it is someone whispered to me, “Be quiet, Megan,” as if they were right in bed next to me.  I woke up with a start.  

Not a good night.

Dry

you want to cry

but you have been dry for so long

that despair has cut a dirt rock river

through the canyons of 

your lungs

Unraveling

With an anxious sigh, Polly Wiggle-Waggle scanned her family’s account books, looking for good news that simply was not there.  Poor Polly was running out of ideas.  Try as she might to persuade them otherwise, her parents refused to admit that the family was in a financial crisis.  “The Wiggle-Waggles,” her father had intoned, after Polly waved the account books under his nose, “do not have financial crises!” 

If only that were true.  Yes, Lord and Lady Wiggle-Waggle, Polly’s parents, still lived in the great manor that had been the family seat for the last 37 generations.  And yes, they still gave the most glamorous garden parties in the county.  But with the family’s income drying up, and her parents’ complete inability to grasp reality, Polly was at her wits’ end for ways to raise funds for the summer fete her mother insisted on hosting.

In desperation Polly looked around the living room, searching for an old vase or painting her parents wouldn’t miss if she pawned it off a London antiques shop.  It was, she knew, a hopeless cause.  Thanks to such raids in the past Polly’s parents were beginning to notice that the manor seemed a bit emptier than usual, even though it was still crammed full of family heirlooms.  

And of course Polly could forget about suggesting to her father that he get a job.  Lord Wiggle-Waggle’s face had gone beet red the last time she’d dared to raise the subject. “The Wiggle-Waggles,” he’d boomed, “do not have jobs!”  Nor had Lady Wiggle-Waggle been of much help when Polly had approached her after dinner yesterday.  “Darling,” she’d sniffed to Polly, “how many times do I have to tell you?  It’s vulgar for a lady to discuss matters of finance!”

Polly just did not know what to do.  With her brother Alfred even more clueless than her parents—he was incapable of any conversation not concerning lawn tennis or his London gentleman’s club—Polly felt utterly alone.  If only she could think of a way to make some money…