One in Billions

Flame rolls off the bark licking the stiffness from my fingers.
Face flushes
Deep red pressing to the surface
Boyish good looks or childish features?
One of ten billion
yet
feeling so unique
Like a snowflake
Not possible to be original.

Time passes
The same for everyone?
Each individual mind frozen in a block of consciousness.
Dripping moments of life into the wax bowl of human experience.
The flame rolls back
Hardness sets in
Blue, Brown, & Green
Fish bowl
Forever.

Haiku

When you're feeling sick
The world contains no odor
Will this ever end?

Poem written backstage before a performance

Sun sits on the horizon
Time to rise then
Take the stage
A brilliant sage
Or a failure
You're never sure
Until the lights are out

My bones shivering, shaking
They'll see that I'm a fake
Can I walk out there
face my fear
Find the bravery
The only way to see
my commitments to the end

I find my center and calm
Shake my hands and flex my palms
stretch my hips
breathe in sips
twist my head
Blow out the dread
And find I'm ready to go on.

The loss of my Grandmother

Turning the silver crank, I watch my grandmother sink into the shining casket.
They fold in her blanket and lower the lid.
I watch them push the lid,
Open it,
Adjust her body,
and reapply force.
I'll be carrying that casket in a few minutes.
I have no worries about the weight:
It won't be much more than the weight of the casket.


Where has she gone
The woman who couldn't have a friend over without a deck of cards.
Who loved gambling
A penny a point
or
A trip to the casino.
Only the dealer is wild
And she was a wild one
Full of life.


Until Parkinson's hit
Then...


She became scared,
Left her home,
I won more card games than I lost
She saw the water and the spiders spitting their disease.
She was found on the floor
Christmas Evening
Trading turkey for physical therapy


The promise of home if only she would get "better"


She pushed herself through the pain to end in a nursing home.
On her deathbed she whispered the hope of returning home.
Withered, Dry, and Dying with only one request:
To Go Home!


It's hard to think of her at home when my hand wraps around her cold wrist,
Or as I lift her permanent home by the cold chrome


She wrote a letter that expressed her belief that she was joining my grandpa.
All I can see is her joining him in a house of dirt and worms,
Locked away,
Dropped down,
Sealed in,
Covered.


She'll be missed,
but is she mist?
Is she somewhere
Living
And Loving
Or
Lost?