Christmas & New Years for the Pets

The vet that took Hunter's xrays last year sent us some cool stuff I thought I'd share. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

A list of rules to read to your pet (unless you taught them to read!):
1. Be especially patient with your humans during this time. They may appear to be more stressed-out than usual and they will appreciate long comforting dog leans.
2. They may come home with large bags of things they call gifts. Do not assume that all the gifts are yours.
3. Be tolerant if your humans put decorations on you. They seem to get some special kind of pleasure out of seeing how you look with fake antlers.
4. They may bring a large tree into the house and set it up in a prominent place and cover it with lights and decorations. Bizarre as this may seem to you, it is an important ritual for your humans, so there are some things you need to know:
*don't pee on the tree
*don't drink the water in the container that holds the tree
*mind your tail when you are near the tree
*if there are packages under the tree, even ones that smell interesting or that have your name on them, don't rip them open
*don't chew on the cord that runs from the funny-looking hole in the wall to the tree
5. Your humans may occasionally invite lots of strangers to come visit during this season. These parties can be lots of fun, but they also call for some discretion on your part:
*not all strangers appreciate kisses and leans
*don't eat off the buffet table
*beg for goodies subtly
*be pleasant, even if unknowing strangers are sitting on your couch
*don't drink out of glasses that are left within your reach
6. Likewise, your humans may take you visiting. Here your manners will also be important:
*observe all the rules in #4 for trees that may be in other people's houses
*respect the territory of other animals that may live in the house
*tolerate children
*turn on your charm big time
7. A big man with a white beard and a very loud laugh may emerge from your fireplace in the middle of the night. DON'T BITE HIM!

A Cat's New Years Resolutions:
I will not slurp fish food from the surface of the aquarium.
I must not help myself to Q-Tips, and I must certainly not proceed to stuff them down the sink's drain.
I will not stand on the bathroom counter, stare down the hall, and growl at NOTHING after my humans has finished watching the X-Files.
I will not use the bathtub to store live mice for late-night snacks.
I will not perch on my human's chest in the middle of the night and stare into her eyes until she wakes up.
We will not play Herd of Thundering Wildebeests Stampeding Across the Plains of the Serengeti over any human' bed while they are trying to sleep.
I will not assume the patio door is open when I race outside to chase leaves.
I will not intrude on my human's candle-lit bubble bath and singe my bottom.

A Dog's New Years Resolutions:
I will stop trying to find the few remaining clean pieces of carpet in the house when I am about to throw up.
I will not roll on dead seagulls, fish, crabs, etc.
I will not eat other animal's poop.
I will not lick my human's face after eating animal poop.
I will not eat my own vomit.
I will not eat "kitty box crunchies".
I will not chew my human's toothbrush for flavor and not tell them.
I will not chew crayons or pens.
I will not bark each time I hear the doorbell on tv.
I will not walk under the big dog when he is peeing.
I will not steal Mom's underwear and dance all over the backyard with it.
I will not play tug-a-war with Dad's underwear when he is on the toilet.
My head does not belong in the refrigerator.
The couch is not a face towel. Neither are Mom and Dad's laps.
The garbage collector is NOT stealing our stuff.
I must shake the rainwater out of my fur before entering the house.

Punch-drunk Elves!

Oh no! Santa's best helpers got a little carried away at the Christmas party! Hope they sober up soon and get back to work :)

Suburgatory Revised

They come and go, the neighbors,
to and from their vinyl domains
each evening while I sit
and write my poems on the porch,
watching them over my papers.
A neighbor to the left is plenty sociable,
saying hello as we pass in our driveways
and greeting my dogs kindly if they trespass
our boundary to pee on his tree.
My house is on the tip of our suburban land,
windows facing the cookie-cutter properties
leaving all to view.
Strange moments have occurred in this place;
such as the back door popping suddenly
once evening a few weeks ago,
leaving ears ringing, dogs howling.
What was that? It sounded like a gunshot!
Quickly from one room to the next,
we peek around the burgundy curtain
knowing it came from there, his house.
It is the only sound we hear.
Should we go see if they need help?
Six squad cars, two fire trucks, and
one ambulance fill the cul-de-sac,
lights circulating and flashing.
Assuming it was a fight with his daughter
or wife gone very array, we watch for a body bag
but none emerges.

This suburban life is stable,
one day not too vastly different than the one before.
The neighbors smile and wave
as they come and go.

Possibility Of You In Others

You are all babes:
newborn hands clasp a knuckle,
rose petal lips pucker the air
in search of mom, milk.

Pointed toes tap the floor
as torso wobbles and arms flay.
Knees are the mode for motion.

A round face, sticky fingers,
no teeth in the chipmunk smile
pronouncing a first word proudly
over and over.

Splashes in the water, waves rock
toys afloat as giggles fill the air,
both large and small, circling the tub.

A rocking chair pair sway gently
in the blackest of the eve
and soft song hovers within the walls
while large eyes empty and close.

Out Of Control, Mine

“I just need to see her again! Momma! Momma!”
The girl lay crumpled against the concrete, the carpet.
Leaning into them for comfort, safety, answers.
Begging her aunt, who stood unknowing of what to do
to help the girl or her brother. He stood four feet away
silent, shocked. Tears ran down rosy cheeks.
The aunt looked between both, frozen, panicked.

I paused as did my heart, balancing
on the tip of my foot, rocking, then sped
right by following the arrows
to the exit, the elevator, freedom.
Waves of stomach rolled upwards
pushing at my chest, my throat.
I looked behind once then only forward.

Thirty five minutes earlier their giggles filled the air,
feet swung back and forth, small fingers fluttered
in front of a sibling’s nose. Those in the lobby
had observed, quietly watching the pair, wondering,
some holding their own babies, wiping faces.
The air was heavy only for us who had visited before;
us, who knew life changed after this moment, visitation.

I returned my guest pass for my license
through the slot in the windowed counter
and pushed past the crowd, the glass doors.
Cold air slapped my skin and clouded my eyes
but I pretended to dig in my bag for my keys
as I bolted for the parking lot, away from
the high walls and barbed wire, corruption.

An Incestuous Story Containing No Incest

Incest was prominent in fictional family structures in the late eighteenth- early nineteenth-century as “sons are exhorted to see their parents' female wards as sisters; older men adopt paternal stances to young, unprotected women; and servants love their masters as children ideally love their parents” (Shaffer 67). Father-daughter incest is the most widely reported and thus, the most common form of incest known in fictional works. However, some stories do choose to elaborate on mother-son or sibling incest instead of the patriarchal original structure of father-daughter love. Mary Shelly, author of Mathilda, wasn’t unique in writing the story of a so-called incestuous relationship between father and daughter, but certainly made it clear that her two main characters, Mathilda and her father, do not at any point have intercourse. Mathilda is considered an incestuous novel but it seems that both characters only have a deep, extreme love for one another not resulting from a physical relationship together, but lack of personal ones and contact with society.

Mathilda’s personal relationship with her father and love for him in that father-figure role, which is expressed through her narration about her life in first person, seems to grow from her familiarization of him being involved with her after being absent from her life for sixteen years. “Familiarization comes closest to incest when parental-filial or sibling love shifts at least on one side to romantic or sexualized love” (Shaffer 72). Mathilda’s father is the one in the family’s relationship to change the dynamics when he confesses his love for her instead of to her. The difference in his confessing love for her and to her is this: confessing love to someone is the equal of telling them how you feel in terms of the family, or an otherwise understood, intimate relationship, while confessing love for someone is to announce for the first time to them that you have feelings of intimacy in mind for your relationship. At what point do the lines of “familiarization and incest blur”? (Shaffer 73).

Sanchez-Eppler acknowledges that “the incestuous patterns suggested and disguised by these stories can provide at most only elusive access to actual behaviors” (Sanchez-Eppler 8). Though a disconcerting realization, Sanchez-Eppler is correct that only the actual members of an incestuous relationship, no matter the kind, can relay the occurrences to others outside it. However, she argues in her article that these inappropriate moments between family members were caused mainly by alcohol and that the children, mostly young, preadolescent girls, acted as a salve to their father’s rage and abuse by volunteering for the intimate though wrongful relationship as a substitute for the sort of love they should be receiving.

The story Mathilda shows one example of the diverse situations of incest and that those who believe that the daughter is the general insinuator for romantic love aren’t always right in their assumptions. Mathilda’s father, in contrast to Sanchez-Eppler’s essay, isn’t a drunkard but a sorrowful man still mourning the loss of his wife almost two decades later and eventually misplaces his romantic feelings onto his daughter after comparing her to his deceased wife, Diana. Mathilda isn’t a young, preadolescent girl, but for the time and culture, the proper age a woman would begin searching suitors for a husband. She also doesn’t strive for her father to desire her. In fact, she doesn’t realize that she reciprocates his love in the same way until after his death and the guilt she feels for the rest of her short life is the result of never being able to tell him so.

“My eyes were seldom raised and often filled with tears; no song; no smiles; no careless motion that might bespeak a mind intent on what surrounded it – I was gathered up into myself – a selfish solitary creature ever pondering on my regrets and faded hopes (Shelley 1362-1363).

Sanchez-Eppler makes a good point about desire and innocence in conjunction with incestuous relationships when she says that “a ‘monstrous’ sexual attraction to children, however strenuously denied and demonized, nevertheless informs nineteenth-century conceptions of desire, domesticity, and even of innocence itself” (Sanchez-Eppler 8). Mathilda did indeed desire to know her father for the majority of her life and often dreamed of him and meeting him while she was being raised by her aunt. The innocence that would have been from a basic family connection became fantasized in her mind, and we later learn his too, as she dreams about scenarios in which she runs away to find him.

The exploration of innocence, desire, and domestic responsibility through Mathilda’s narrative allows us to enter a world otherwise unknown, unless we have participated in such relationships ourselves, and see the delicate balance of parenthood, or lack thereof, during that time. Mathilda’s distant relationship with her aunt as an infant then young girl, including the sparse physical contact, made the connection with her father extreme once it occurs and it is evident that “love was clearly the best way to rule the home” (Sanchez-Eppler 4).

But where does society come into the picture of incest for Mathilda? The death of her mother and immediate departure of her father leaves Mathilda in her aunt’s care; an aunt who decides to return to her own home in the country because “she had too long lived alone and undisturbed” and therefore “took (Mathilda) with her to her Scotch estate” (Shelley 1314). Mathilda learns to entertain herself because her aunt refuses to let her play with the village children for fear of Mathilda developing an accent so she plays alone in the woods for majority of her days until she begins receiving tutoring from the neighbor. This removal from society and lack of visitation between her and other people outside of her aunt and servants makes Mathilda desperate for companionship. When her father arrives in her life, Mathilda experiences, for the first time, a true relationship with another human being. “And now I began to live. All around me was changed from a dull uniformity to the brightest scene of joy and delight” (Shelley 1345). Mathilda’s father even moves her to London with him and back into society after the aunt’s death.

Mathilda’s subconscious connects this new relationship with her father to interaction, travel, attention from others, and the busy society itself as her father dotes on her and for the first time she feels truly loved by a parent figure. On the other hand, Mathilda’s father experiences a satisfying connection with a woman for the first time in sixteen years. A woman that resembles his deceased wife, shares his likeness in activities, and in turn gives him the devotion he had been lacking while traveling the globe trying to forget her and his past. Mathilda hasn’t ever experienced the feeling of love before and assumes that this relationship with her father is normal, which it seems to be until his confession. He however, knows that his feelings are inappropriate after realizing his jealousy of one of Mathilda’s suitors. He removes himself from the situation by leaving Mathilda in the city and returning to the home he shared with his wife. “He informed me that he had determined to go to Yorkshire first alone, and that I should follow him in a fortnight” (Shelley 1349).

Upon following her father, Mathilda learns that his condition has worsened. She gives him time to heal then grows perplexed when he still hasn’t pursued a connection with her like he had the first few months of their knowing each other. This second removal completely from society puts Mathilda back to where she was at the start of the novel, dependent on one family member and having contact with them alone in addition to the household servants. Mathilda decides after this move back to nature that she needs a relationship with another human being now that she has experienced one. “Mathilda, hoping to remedy a coldness and moroseness in her father she does not understand, urges him to share his sorrow with her” (Garrett 45). This moment ironically foreshadows his death shortly after this moment and her death only a few years later. Asking him to express his feelings, Mathilda says, “do not fear! Speak that word; it will bring peace, not death” though the next time we see her father in the story, it is a view of his corpse (Shelley 1352). Upon the confession, Mathilda is horrified at first and cries but then begins to pity her father and how his feelings torment him. Looking down at him she recollects herself and realizes what her pity means.

“Yes it was despair I felt; for the first time that phantom seized me; the first and only time for it has never since left me--After the first moments of speechless agony I felt her fangs on my heart: I tore my hair; I raved aloud; at one moment in pity for his sufferings I would have clasped my father in my arms; and then starting back with horror I spurned him with my foot; I felt as if stung by a serpent, as if scourged by a whip of scorpions which drove me…” (Shelley 1353).

It is important to note here that no physical contact has occurred between them through-out the story. This stinging Mathilda feels isn’t a sexual innuendo but genuine shock that her one decent familial relationship with her one remaining parent is from this moment no longer innocent love but a driving passion. The phantom she references as seizing her is acknowledgement of her father’s feelings. Leaving her father in misery, Mathilda retires to her room for the night to cry waking up after dreaming of his impending death to discover his letter apologizing to her.

The move to London from her aunt’s house with her father is Mathilda’s first interaction with society and this second removal to nature is the main reason she cares for her father so much and eventually realizes that she loves him back, though not in a sexual way. This loss of society and then the loss of her father, builds her need for him and her dependence on his connection with her. “The story of Mathilda provides Mary Shelley with a framework for exploring the theme of the moral responsibilities one has to one’s beloved” (Garrett 45). Mathilda’s father obviously doesn’t have these feelings of moral responsibilities because he finds it so easy to leave her with a relative and travel in an attempt to forget his wife and sorrow.

Garrett’s essay focuses mainly on what a woman’s role in a love relationship is compared to what it should be. She used Mary Shelley herself as an example of how the sadness and deaths during her lifetime affected her stories, Mathilda included. Using the grief of her own miscarriages as a channel, Shelley explored parent-child relationships and the love that grows from them and what could occur if family situations were adjusted. One of these such adjustments is shown in her story of Mathilda as a child grows up with no love from a parent or other relative and is then overwhelmed with the first experience.

Since Mathilda’s father left her as an infant her natural feelings were intensified as she dreamed of him. After meeting him and feeling the extreme love he professes, his suicide affects her drastically and she retires to where no one knows her. “I must shrink before the eye of man lest he should read my father’s guilt in my glazed eyes: I must be silent lest my faltering voice should betray unimagined horrors” (Shelley 1360). It is her father’s guilt and his unimagined horrors that change her view on love and scar her until her death five years later at age twenty two. She claims that by going to live surrounded by nature again heals her soul a little bit because she can cry or rage in solitude and be returned to peace.

Though no physical contact is ever made between Mathilda and her father in the duration of the story, we see their love as it morphs from imagination, to reality, to a memory. The love Mathilda and her father share is in fact a deep romantic love but not incestual because no intercourse occurs between them. Only those in the relationship however, know the true function of it. Mathilda’s innocence is changed to desire only after her father’s confession and suicide. The grief of the novel is stemmed from Shelley’s own personal tragedies and allows her to explore the balance of a parent-child relationship. Shelley also considers how society plays a role in raising children and the ways that affected her characters relationship. The lack of personal connections with anyone of significance or even townspeople is what awakens this intense love between father and daughter but since neither character has actual physical contact with the other in an intimate way, Mathilda is not an incestuous novel.

Visiting My Baby Brother At The Beaufort County Detention Center On October 15, 2011

Mom sat poised and calm in the burgundy plastic chair
holding a list of topics to talk about in her left hand,
the blue pay phone in her right, pressed gently to ear,
while she looked through the glass at her only son.

I was next to her, eyes filled and hands vibrating,
fidgeting with my necklace and blinking,
breathing slowly, deeply, in and out, fighting nausea.
Oh, Ryan. Why? Don’t be a follower, be a leader.

It scared me how so very lean he was, how tall.
The rough bright orange shirt and pants
made his normally cream-colored face white-washed,
and sallow. The guards had buzzed his head,
but not completely, leaving only a centimeter
of brown hair, remembrance of his wavy locks.

“Ryan, you have to remember to sign the release papers
on Monday so we can get your car back to Charleston.
And we put money in your account so you can buy
a calling card and some snacks. Or just calling cards.”

Tell him you love him Mom. Tell him he’s still your baby
and that this doesn’t matter. Tell him we’ll take him home.
Tell him you love him.

I kept hovering slightly over the chair and tugging
at the bottom, moving it closer to the concrete table
and Plexiglas. Closer to Ryan. I glanced alternately
from the crude drawings and words carved out
of the surface to my big little brother.

“Oh, and I paid forty dollars so you can get a Public Defender
sooner and hopefully to court a little faster. If you don’t hear
from one by Wednesday, you need to tell me ok?
It’s important.”

She is so much stronger than me. How is she so calm?
The list was a smart idea but I hope he remembers.
I’ll ask him when it’s my turn if he does.

“Are you ok, Ryan? You have things you need?
You’re safe?” He replied yes, he was alright,
he even had nickname from a guy named Country.
He said it was only his first time, and that was a good thing
because other guys had the number twenty-seven
on their armbands. Their twenty-seventh time.

I studied his body language and bare arms
as he spoke, looking for any marks or fear.
He seemed like himself and his arms were clear.
Accepting his answers, Mom said, "I love you Ryan.
You can talk to your sister for a bit now.”

I stood and switched chairs with her, took the large phone,
and scooting close again, I looked up at him and made faces
biting my lip, battling with the tears. “Hunter still goes
in your room at my house. He’ll go and sit and cry til I put him
up on the bed and pet him. He misses sitting with you.
And I miss you too. I get lonely on station days now
with no one to talk to but the dogs.”

I stare at the Love dug out of the white painted table,
the “O” just a vacant hole and my leg shakes.

We talk for a few minutes about useless things
and I laugh when I want to cry
until the guard comes back and taps on the door
to the small bricked room, and answers you
that yes, time is up. I hear it echo through the phone.

No! Don’t take him away! I only had ten minutes!
He’s my baby brother and we only have a lifetime.
Our time is precious. He needs me to stay…
I need him to stay.

“Ryan, I just want to hug you.” And my heart breaks
as he places his palm to the Plexiglas. I put mine up too,
and marvel at the sizes. I just want to reach through
and hold him here. “I love you Ryan. I love you.”

When he takes his hand down, Mom bangs on the window
and calls out. She wants the connection too.
Her heart breaks too. We say again that we love him,
and watch him go, before we turn towards our own door.

A Classmate Giving A Presentation

With the end of each sentence
she gestures grandly, waving her number two

pencil tip daringly close to my side,
holding the eraser like a sword handle

giving my imagination ideas of being impaled,
or at least stabbed,

leading to an embarrassing emergency call:
“Help! She’s been shish-kabobbed

by a centimeter of wood and lead!”
Could a pencil kill?

I’m sure its been done before
but that’s an unhappy thought.

How shocked would the class be
if I grabbed up my pen in defense

and began a combattre?
Maybe then she would not be so interested

in explaining riddles and their roots.

For My Mother

The first wound I received in life was grand:
a small hole remains from where all
was once given from you through a vital cord
which, once snipped slid slowly from my body, -
long gone now, but then meant to you Mine. Whole
you were with a ninth-month swell,
belly stretched taught and tight
filled with me. Stomach skin flattened,
naval protruding at the round height,
the special bulge remained until the agony
of hours granted you, me,
and I received that wound.
– My original loneliness, and yours.

Imitation of Kimberly Johnson’s Ode on My Belly Button

Suburgatory

They come and go, the neighbors,
to and from their vinyl domains
each morning while I sit
and write my poems on the porch,
watching them over my papers.
The family directly across the street
has a small son, Hayden, with lots of blonde
curly hair whom they adore,
deservedly so.
To the left lives an old State Trooper
and his wife. They keep to themselves
mostly but will lend a blender if needed.
I’ve heard them quarreling gently
about shaving his beard from time to time
as they come and go, probably to church.
Four navy men, each with a tiny
tricked-out car live two houses down
and they completely ignore the stop sign
each time, barely slowing down
for the right turn.
A polite male couple who wave
as they pass reside at exactly a
forty-five degree angle from me.
Clean-shaven and always well-dressed,
I hear them training their black lab
in the evenings, clapping when he does well.
My last neighbor is slightly more sociable
saying hello as we pass in our driveways
and greeting my dogs kindly if they trespass
to pee on her tree. This suburban life is stable,
one day not to vastly different than the one before.

A Drink Of World

I searched for the world everywhere,
but it had tipped out of my tea cup;
world was gone, nowhere to be seen.

I resent myself for not taking it immediately,
for not sipping it’s depth straight away
when I had all the opportunity.

Ah, if I had drank when chance had presented,
I would be full up of life and experience,
too much for my delicate china cup to hold.

To Joshua

I posted a fragment of this poem I wrote on my FB page and it received a lot of comments so I thought I'd post it in it's entirety here with the one I imitated from Sappho. Sappho was a Greek poet in the 6th Century, the only women poet. She was mostly famous for her love poems to other women. (Remember in Greece everyone was considered bi-sexual.) Please tell me what you think! A poet loves criticism! :)

To Joshua

I loved you, Joshua, then and still,
from when I was yet of age to date,
especially a man – an older man,
even one such as you, whom my family loved.

*

Do you remember the night I wore the red dress?

*

It was, you say, the night you fell in love with me,
watching me cross the living room in my gown,
my hair curled and half undone, our eyes met
and I paused there, tucking a strand behind my ear

only for it to spring loose again before
I stepped the next few feet into the hall, out of sight.

There have been several moments (more than I
can count, for sure), when you’ve crossed in front

of me, shirtless, and I have no words, no voice,
as I watch you pull clothes on, covering muscle.

The room surrounding us didn’t exist then,
no walls, no floors, no breath.

*

I ask all the Gods, on every day we spend together,
to be pregnant with time in a miniscule hourglass.

*

I begged with them: I desire.

*

Someone, I tell you, will remember our love,
even in another time.


An imitation of Sappho’s Six Fragments for Atthis


...Now here's Sappho's poem that I used the structure of...

Six Fragments for Atthis (Translated by Sherod Santos)

I loved you, Atthis, years ago,
when my youth was still all flowers
and sighs, and you - you seemed to me
such a small ungainly girl

*

Can you forget what happened before?

*

If so, then I'll remind you how, while lying
beside me, you wove a garland of crocuses
which I then braided into strands of your hair.
And once, when you'd plaited a double necklace

from a hundred blooms, I tied it around
the swanning, sun-licked ring of your neck.

And on more than one occasion (there were two
of them, to be exact), while I looked on, too

silent with adoration to say your name,
you glazed your breasts and arms with oil.

No holy place existed without us then,
no woodland, no dance, no sound.

*

Beyond all hope, I prayed those timeless
days we spend might be made twice as long.

*

I prayed one word: I want.

*

Someone, I tell you, will remember us,
even in another time.

Birdhouse Thoughts

In the backyard, on an old Oak tree, there is a small wooden birdhouse.
It isn’t painted, but the Sparrow family doesn’t seem to mind.
I watch them through an upstairs window, like a nosey neighbor
with my breath on the glass. I crack it an inch
to hear them sing to each other, chirping quietly back and forth,
often in short melodies.

The sound reminds me of being newly twitter pated, of May,
of a walk together as the sun was setting behind us amongst the pines,
of dinner made while the radio played in the background,
tangled up in our laughter, much like the brown bird’s calls.

I feel your arms come around my waist as you sneak up behind me
to join in the spying. We stand and watch a moment
as the humble creatures gather twigs and leaves
from the grass inside the fence to bring to their recently acquired home.

The hands that built that birdhouse are the same strong hands
that hold me close each night, playing a game of Big Spoon, Little Spoon.
Those calloused palms and fingers become mellow when intertwined with mine,
crafty to fix a leak under the sink, playful when you wrestle with the dogs,
calculated to apply a band aid to a nephew’s knee, or desperate, if animal instinct is aroused.

Before I can catch you, you rip me from my thoughts
by lifting a forefinger and tapping on the pane.
The Sparrow pair pauses in song and movement before flying back to their space,
one you created.

Little Moments

Today Josh and I were just going to do some general chores around the house like installing a new bedroom ceiling fan, cleaning, giving the dogs baths, things of that nature. Instead we decided to go tint his windows since it is the middle of summer and there is absolutely none on his car, it's completely see-though. It was going to be my treat. Told him it would be his birthday present since I'll be finishing my last year of school and probably not working enough (or at all) to buy him anything then.

So I followed him over and dropped the car off then we hopped in mine and decided to do my favorite thing in the world, visit a book store. I mean who can't walk into a bookstore and not instantly have hundreds of dollars of books for purchasing in their arms?? Oh if I won the lottery I'd build my own library. Just for me. Walls and walls of books like in the Beauty and the Beast. Maybe I'd even attach it to the house...

Anyway, I mosied through all the rows and stopped to look at history books about the Queens of England and past rulers, flipped a few pages of books in the "Dog" section (my fave) and looked at the goofy puppies, stopped to look at Emma Watson on the cover of Vogue magazine (I can't believe the last Harry Potter movie is coming out in only two weeks!), and finally ended up sitting in the "Family" section looking at the cute babies.

It was only about five minutes until Josh, who was looking at men magazines, realized that he lost me, which is easy to do in a store like that cause I'm like a kid at Disneyworld. He turned the corner and saw me sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the "What to Expect" books and came over sitting next to me. We talked about the seriously freakish fact that though a baby can grow inside you, which is completely awesome, the person in charge of planning how that tiny human comes out, (the big man upstairs) could have reconsidered the current plan of action known as "birth".

Another fifteen minutes later I was completely consumed reading the car-crash facts, (you know where it's so horrible and yet so fascinating you can't look away?), Josh's A.D.D. kicked in and he had found his own book and came back to my side, "Dude, You're Gonna Be A Dad!" An older couple walked by looking at us sprawled in the aisle together and smiled and nodded to each other like they knew some great fact we didn't and found it amusing. Josh leaned over and tapped my knee with his finger pointing at some line on the first page "If you're holding this book, you're either an expectant dad or on your way in that direction and so far you're doing an awesome job! This book is designed to help you get from the stick turning blue to the delievery room and here's the first tip, for the next nine months you need to be thinking about WHAT YOU CAN DO FOR HER instead of WHAT'S HAPPENING TO HER."

I giggled and asked him why all his baby books are hilarious while mine are all terrifying pictures and creepy words. Maybe I'll write the first chick pregnancy book that is more about the awesomeness and less about the hormornes. Unless of course that's already been attempted and the hormones can't be over-looked. (That's a scary thought.) But maybe I'm just optimistic enough to over-look them.

Jotting down a few titles and then jumping back in the car I told Josh that I was completely comfortable with any degree of involvement he wanted when we experience all that in few years. He told me when we got engaged that there was "No way I'm cutting that rope attached to you and the kid" so I already knew some of this creeped him out as much as me. Again, the planning on a bowling ball-sized baby coming out of petite me is a tad mind blowing. I figure Mom will help a lot with that part having given birth to three kids and being knowledgeable in the trade of babies. I mean I know about taking care of them from years of babysitting and daycare work but the rest of it is new news. What else are mom's for if not to help us (their own kids) learn how to handle new stages in life including the birth of their grandkids? It's like she said to me the other day, "It's a lifetime commitment". All the more reason to talk about "it" (reproducing the species) way before you hit the stage of actually building a crib.

Driving home in my car after dropping Josh off to pick his up, my iPod shuffled to our song, the one Josh picked that we danced to first at the wedding, "Little Moments" by Brad Paisley. You know, the man is a lyrical genius. It's completely true that life is all put together by little moments and celebrated in the big. If you stop and think, our lives are made up mostly by the everyday conversations, meal times, chores and activities. Things like killing time in a bookstore. It's exciting to think about the future in my opinion with the babies and vacations and everday life, but I'm also completely happy with the present: family, pets, school and work. I have one more year of wonderful school and did I tell you that Josh is going back to school? He wants to be a mechanic and is going to start in September. He'll be done and certified around the same time I am. Then we'll maybe buy the baby books of the titles we wrote down today... :)

Song of Marriage

Some look down their noses at us and comment.
“You’re so young! Why are you married?”
Us whole is hard work. It’s too easy to fall apart.
A lot of it is scheduling but we’ve had a year of practice.

I have become adjusted to being alone
every third day. Silence in this big house is broken by
echoes of the dogs barking against the tile downstairs
or Charlie the cat meowing loudly to himself at two am.
The hum of the ceiling fan over the bed sings me to sleep.
I never thought I would be comfortable
with entire days of quiet or solitude. But I am now.

No one had to tell me that marriage is talking.
Talking to you about money, the pets, the house, children.
“Be sure to leave things outside the marriage at the doorstep.”
I think we’re good at that. Broken homes can produce good matches.

Which groceries are more important to buy
and which can wait til the next paycheck?
Milk, we always need milk. Bring some home just in case.
Did you remember to fix the closet door?
I don’t want it falling on me.
I think the purple room door needs sanding too.
Do you need help? I have no idea where the screwdriver is.

I know having a handicapped pet is difficult,
but don’t you agree that he came to us for the right reasons?
Too many people I know would put Hunter down
instead of buying him a wheelchair
that cost as much as the tires my Honda needs.
You want to foster another dog? Really?
Yeah I’m in, but what about starting a family in two years?
Or our trip to Europe after my graduation?
You know most people who foster end up adopting right?
Well, let’s get a senior. They need homes the most.

I took the dogs to the beach today since you were at the station.
You should’ve seen Hunter in the waves in his chair. He loved it.
He played with other dogs and he ran across the sand with Cooper.
Several people blessed me, blessed us.

What do you want for dinner? Did you thaw the chicken?
We can do spaghetti; it’s your favorite and simple.
Want to watch a movie while I do schoolwork?
Do you still have that practice burn tomorrow?
Lake afterwards? We could bring the dogs to swim
and take a walk afterwards. It does sound nice.

You bought another rug? Yeah, that’s fine, the tile makes my feet cold.
It was only thirty seven dollars? Definitely worth it.
It matches the dining room, let’s put it in there.

Do you remember the toast your dad gave at our wedding last year?
He said he thought each person has a certain amount of words
to use in their life and you’re quiet, not because I talk so much,
but because you’re running out of words and we need them?
I think about that speech every day. He was right.

Somewhere in Wyoming

A barn, large and red, trimmed in white,
settles itself in a field of wheat
that dances to and fro, yellow and gold.
Right is a homely pale blue house,
two stories tall. Windows reflect the sun,
eggshell paint peels from the railing
that is the front porch. Two welcoming
rocking chairs the color of butter
and freshly cleaned sway slightly in the breeze.

Apple pie is in the air, mixed with manure,
or dirt. Laundry from the line out back
wafts the light scent of lavender into
the oil dripping from the tractor nearby.

A motor far off in the distance rumbles
down a country lane moving away
and crickets can be heard though twilight
hasn’t yet fallen. Horses nay and whinny
stomping their hooves for grain and
the screen door slams in response.

The Effects of Marriage

327 days move quickly like water in a storm drain.
There are moments when it all rushes up,
when the fabric frays or tears.
Each night I sew up all the loose strands
that come undone with the day.
I take the words of others and pack them
carefully in a box, ship it to Greenland.
“I love you” comes out like word vomit.
I thought we were strong. Like a rock.
Doubt creeps in my ear at night sometimes
and lays her eggs, like gentle thoughts.
I exterminate and dam up the walls.
I want to fold you into an origami duck
and place you somewhere deep in my cupboard.
A shoebox that only I know the combination for.
I’ll set it under my boots and bury it in scarves,
tuck you away from the world and keep you for myself.
Or maybe one day I will become a swan and
we can migrate away. Do swans migrate?
I say they do, I say I do and we shall fly
to the coast of Ireland just because we wish
for the salt of the sea to touch our cheeks.

My Favorite Poem

Why I Am Not A Painter - Frank O'Hara

I am not a painter, I am a poet.
Why? I think I would rather be
a painter, but I am not. Well,

for instance, Mike Goldberg
is starting a painting. I drop in.
"Sit down and have a drink" he
says. I drink; we drink. I look
up. "You have SARDINES in it."
"Yes, it needed something there."
"Oh." I go and the days go by
and I drop in again. The painting
is going on, and I go, and the days
go by. I drop in. The painting is
finished. "Where's SARDINES?"
All that's left is just
letters, "It was too much," Mike says.

But me? One day I am thinking of
a color: orange. I write a line
about orange. Pretty soon it is a
whole page of words, not lines.
Then another page. There should be
so much more, not of orange, of
words, of how terrible orange is
and life. Days go by. It is even in
prose, I am a real poet. My poem
is finished and I haven't mentioned
orange yet. It's twelve poems, I call
it ORANGES. And one day in a gallery
I see Mike's painting, called SARDINES.

-- I love this poem because it explains everything a poet does in such a humorous manner. We take what inspires us and work it until we feel uncomfortable and keep working it until it barely resembles what inspires us. I meet people all the time who look at me funny when I describe myself as a poet. It seems dated and odd to them that I have an interest writing what few people read, but I'm no different than anyone else. I work what intrigues me, I follow what I feel I'm good at. I add words and change lines. I'm just like a painter.

April 3, 2011 10:52am

Tears form in my eyes but I don’t let them fall.
Fanning them like a beauty queen
who just won the crown, I turn on the blinker
and shift over into the right lane.
The speed limit on International Boulevard
isn’t very fast but people zipping by me
seem desperate to leave their memories at the airport.
I just want to head back. Or make it the first trip there,
begin the weekend all over again. Rewind to the Friday night nerves,
the slow moving digital clock, the pages of Everything She Thought She Wanted.

“Atlanta – Delta – 8:38 – Arrived” flashes bright orange
on the scoreboard-like sign standing at the exit
of the Cell Phone Waiting area. I sit up tall in the bucket seat
put the book away and pause, breathe. “Come on down!!!”
the text reads. Reverse, Drive, 0.5 miles later a hug.
A hug I never get. A hug I wish I could get daily.
Cruise control on 526 to help me handle the lead foot
my mom passed down, 101.7 ChuckFM plays everything.
Pointing out downtown Charleston and the Cooper River Bridge
that 40,000 people will run a 10K over as we cross the Don Holt.
Foyer, living room, sun room, dining alcove, kitchen, master bedroom,
two guest rooms, bathrooms, laundry room, Cooper, Hunter,
Charlie, Whiskers, Rickee, Bobby, Bob Barker, the cedar chest.

Long way around Charleston County: 17, 526, 26 to King Street.
“Look at the joggers running on East Bay.” Dunkin Donuts coffee,
stopping to see a parade of bridge runners dressed as jail escapees.
I show you the campus buildings one by one and we pause for a picture.
What will the Class of 2012 give CofC? What’s left to give?
Walking from shirts to stickers to hats in the bookstore
I show you the school colors and logo.
Stepping into the crowd of runners, we walk down King Street,
talk about Five Guys, the theatre, Shooz and enjoy lunch at Sticky Fingers.
Surprise Mary Mac! A car ride through the Battery, Citadel, Cooper Bridge
and Patriots Point before we head to the house to let the dogs out.
Discussing movies, basketball, cupcakes, we all relax on the couches
for an hour. Dinner at Los Arcos and I can’t stop glancing at you.
I have your eyes, eyebrows, nose. Mary Mac makes us all order in Spanish.
Josh, you and I panic, each picking things already translated, instead of what
we wanted, hoping we pronounce them right. I eat too much chips and salsa.
We all pile back into the Element and, still chattering,
drop Mary Mac off at her dorm, go home and head to bed.

In the morning we share conversation and sip cups
of freshly brewed coffee in the dining alcove. I take mine with a lot of cream;
you, a tad of cream and sugar. At 9:45am sharp, we are in the car once more.
A quick trip to Panera Bread near Sam’s Club for a cinnamon roll,
then I’m driving, all too soon, towards Charleston International Airport.
How is it already Sunday?
A long hug, a kiss and two sliding glass doors later, you’re gone.

Revising a poem - "Dear Aunt Margarita"

To My Dear Friend, After Her Passing 11-17-10

You passed on a Tuesday in the fall.
It was the first day I noticed that the leaves
on the trees were changing to a fiery orange.
I remember because, that day,
they were blowing sideways as a storm came in.

Wednesday, I baked everything in the house –
cookies, brownies, cupcakes, pies and breads –
to distract myself, to keep my mind occupied.
I brought some to your sisters with my condolences.

Thursday I cried for hours,
unable to accept that you wouldn’t be at your house
if I were to walk over to visit you, to talk,
while the dogs would wait for me on your porch,
like always.

Friday, I tore up the flower garden
that we had often admired,
because the blooms that once cheered me
now only reminded me of your absence.

Saturday, I attended your funeral
with hundreds of others
whose lives you touched,
whose hearts you warmed,
to say goodbye.

Everyone tells me that death
is just a part of life.
But I disagree.
Death is the end of life.


The Day You Died 3-9-11

It was a weekday in the fall.
The first day I really noticed the leaves
on the trees were changing to a fiery orange,
blowing sideways in the wind
as a storm came in.

Cookies, brownies, cupcakes and pies
filled my counter space.
I brought some to your sisters,
with my condolences.

I cried for hours.
You wouldn’t be at your house
if I were to walk over to visit you, to talk,
while the dogs would wait for me on your porch,
like always.

I tore up the flower garden.
Tulips and daisies had died on their stalks
and like you, they now reminded me
too much of your absence.

The last time I saw you,
cancer pained you so, but you smiled.
It was my birthday.
We discussed the regular topics, hugged,
and I said goodbye.
Not knowing it was the last.

Everyone tells me that death
is just a part of life.
But I disagree.
Death is the end of life.


Marguerite, Since You’ve Passed… 3-10-11

I’ve almost had another birthday,
just a few months more.
I haven’t been able to make my special cupcakes –
the margarita ones you liked so much –
since I gave you that last one.
“A margarita cupcake for my Aunt Margarita”

White, soft snow has fallen twice,
and stuck around for a few days.
I let the dogs run down the street –
their normal route to your house –
before I called them back to me.

I saw your sister Donna two months ago
in the BiLo down the way.
I heard her laugh – your laugh –
from aisle four and froze.
Then I ran. Looking, searching,
for the source, for you.
A hug from her is like a hug from you.

The small table and chairs you left me
look great with the burgundy curtains
I bought for the dining room.
We haven’t used the china yet.
The pattern of white Hawaiian flowers
trimmed in gold, is nothing but beautiful.

I planted tulips last month.
Must’ve been sixty bulbs placed into the earth.
They’re sprouting now and I wonder
what colors they’ll be…


Dear Marguerite 3-12-11

I didn’t get to say goodbye to you…
The last time I saw you was on my birthday
when I walked down to your house
to bring you a cupcake I’d made.
I saw that you were tired from a round of chemo,
so I didn’t stay long…I wish I had.

Two days later, when I got the call that you died,
for the first time in a long time, I couldn’t talk.
Instead, I remained in the kitchen for hours.
I baked everything in the house –
cookies, brownies, cupcakes, and pies.
I brought some to your sisters
with my condolences the next day.

I still can’t accept that you won’t be at your house
if I were to walk over to visit you, to talk,
while the dogs would wait for me on your porch,
like always.

I’m sorry I tore up the flower garden.
It only reminded me of your absence,
not the conversations we’d had about them.
I planted tulips instead of daisies this year.
They’re beginning to sprout now.

The shelf life of tulips is very short,
only a few weeks, but they’re such beautiful flowers
I appreciate them even for that small period.
And since they grow out of bulbs,
I know they’ll come back next year.


Dear Aunt Margarita 3-13-11

The last time I saw you,
cancer pained you so, but you smiled.
“A margarita cupcake for my Aunt Margarita…”
It was my birthday.

Cooper and Hunter still know the way to your house,
but we haven’t walked that path in a while.
They lay on my porch now,
and watch me garden alone.

The daisies died when winter came
because it snowed twice last year,
so I planted tulip bulbs instead.
They are sprouting now.

A hug from Donna is a hug from you
and she has your laugh, straight match.
I could tell it was her from aisle four –
baking supplies.

The china sits, untouched, tucked
carefully away in an upstairs closet
next to my wedding dress
and photos you admired.


Dear Aunt Margarita 3-15-11

The last time I saw you,
cancer pained you so, but you smiled.
“A margarita cupcake for my Aunt Margarita…”
It was my birthday then.
Cooper and Hunter still know the way to your house,
but we haven’t walked that path in a while.
They lay on my porch now,
watching me garden alone.
A bowl of peaches rests on the round table
decorated with stone flowers
on top of the Carpathian rug.
The daisies died when winter came
because it snowed twice last year,
so I planted tulip bulbs instead.
I still detest the pruning shears
that callous my palms so.
A hug from Donna is a hug from you
and she has your laugh, straight match.
I could tell it was her from aisle four –
baking supplies.
She is a resurrection of you,
your sister, your twin.
The china sits, untouched, tucked
carefully away in an upstairs closet
next to my wedding dress
and photos you admired
of my life in May and June.

The Christening

A hazy early morning, the sky in oranges
and yellows, all blurred together. Flat like a
mirror, crystalized and clear, the water stays. Rows
of boats stacked, in two separate worlds, sit
waiting for their captains to leave the docks.

It could be Italy, Argentina, or France, possibly.
Don’t you see the masts? There are none.
Slim, long gray lines, barely on the page, position
ships against black, no purple, mountains, along the
lakesides shore. Do you know this place well?

Time is frozen here. A yellow light glows
dimly from within a nearby yacht, but no
face peers from the window. Lined up as
schoolchildren, each in their place, bobbing with the
tide as it flows in, then later, out.

Take the virgin to sea! A bottle of
champagne upon the bow, red vests hanging in
the galley. The grasses dotting the sand hills
sway with the breeze and a gull calls
out before snatching the fish from the wire.

C.H.O.P.

Across from the old, abandoned warehouse
a railway track runs near a small store
that sits on a paved corner,
faded burgundy bricks barely hold it together.
Three large red circles face the street.
The store always opens at ten sharp.

Regular customers in yesterday’s clothes
wait to wander in and make their selections
for a liquid breakfast.
A woman in an over-large, blue, plaid shirt
pulls on the metal bar and slides
through the glass, her left hand
in her pocket.

She moves right to a familiar aisle
turning left when she sees her friend Jack.
An index finger slides lovingly from the cap
to the base as she lifts the bottle
from the shelf.

Back-tracking to the cashier,
who sits near the door,
the woman removes her left hand
clasping green bills and coins.
She drops the exact amount, turns,
and flicks a hand over her shoulder at Jeff,
slipping into the too bright sun.

Her right foot steps right down King Street.
Moving under a bridge, covered with ivy
and decorated with large cracks and crevasses,
discolored yellow concrete, aged from time,
she walks, clutching her pal in a brown bag.

Cars move briskly by, even in daylight,
with windows up and doors locked,
but she knows this part of town.
Her long, disheveled brown hair lifts
in a passing breeze of cigar smoke
from the man in front of her.

Coughing, from his smoke and her age,
she stops to let him get ahead.
Leaning against a mauve wall,
she tilts her head to the sun momentarily
then brings the bag to face level.

Her hands fumble on the black cap.
Pushing off the building to brace herself,
her left foot shuffles forward.
She pivots, looking to see what supported her,
and is surprised to find, the last thing
she thought she needed.
It is the Charleston House Of Prayer.

The Metaphor

1
An egg hits the gray-slated linoleum.
Shattering, spreading yolk and yellow
across the kitchen tiles.
Eggshell white chips lay
in pools of clear, slimy, stretchy core.
Moments later, the cardboard carton
slips from fingers,
landing facedown, open.
Eleven breakfast options establish
themselves near the rug
in front of the stove.

2
Blue yarn slowly separates
as a sweater spins through the wash cycle.
The bottom strand pulls away
from the whole, tangled
in the leg of a pair of jeans
that were accidentally tossed in.
When rinse begins, yarn is
entangled in the shirts,
the other sweaters that sit,
enclosed around the drum.

3
Salt water builds with intensity
as the current runs strong
leading from open ocean
to the shimmering golden shore.
The wave runs around creatures,
people, nature; nothing stopping
the chosen, intended path.
Rising, heightening, increasing,
the wave moves up, foaming, teetering.
Left only to crash back into its origins,
it hangs in balance.

Sweet Heart Cupcakes for Valentine's Day

Sun City, California

Childhood was kissing frogs on a Sunday afternoon
And swinging from the jungle gym in the cool summer evenings,
Bee stings or cuts from rocks left skin red, bruised and tough.
Mom would complain because socks were always ruined
After hours were spent jumping in mud puddles after a storm,
The stains setting as we looked at the clouds from the driveway.

Or maybe the dog could pull us in the wagon
Turning sharply around the curves of the neighborhood,
The wheels wavering and wiggling from the speed.
My room was a shade of blue, the kind that held the sky,
And mom had painted a white picket fence along the bottom
Complete with flowers, grass, and a few specially painted butterflies.

The most important responsibility I had was be in by dark
When the sun would fall behind Mrs. Dallas’ house
And the hot day would become soft.
I’d say bye to her and Clarissa and Billy
Promising to play again tomorrow, first thing,
It was my brother’s surprise birthday party anyway.

War Dance (Edited & Revised)

War Dance 2-3-11

It’s supposed to just be a movie.
Sociology of Peace is all about war.
The movies are supposed to help
Relate us college students
To what other countries
Go through every day.

Nick, sitting behind me
Against the back wall,
Reached up and cut the lights off
As the professor sits in the front row
After turning on the projector.

The sound of drum beats,
Like from Jumunji,
Pounds our ears
When the first scene begins.

“The Rebels tear homes apart
As war rages in Uganda, Africa.
It leaves families destroyed,
Parents, brothers, sisters,
Relatives, separated. Alone.
People are forced to live
In government camps,
Overflowing, for their safety…”

We watch the children’s testimonies.

A young girl named Rose
Tells her story to the camera;
She says she hid with siblings
In the bush outside her home,
While the Rebels grabbed her parents
From their bed, demanding to know
Where the children were.
(The class holds their breath.)
Rose heard her mother deny
That she was such,
Before they were taken.
Three days later, the children
Were found by soldiers in the bush.
They begged and pleaded,
“Where are my parents?
Where is my mother?”
The soldiers took them to a tree
On the edge of the African horizon.
The group brought there, including Rose,
Is told to identify their relatives.
A soldier begins lifting heads
Out of a large cooking pot.
Rose falls crying as she sees her mother,
In a way no child should.

The large tree, so like Rafiki’s,
Fades away as Rose’s face
Is brought back into view
Before the screen fades black
For a moment.

(I blink and look around…
Several of the girls in my class
Have tears running silently
Down their cheeks.
The boys stare with awe-shocked
Or disapproving frowns.
Then the black screen brightens
And we see a young boy.)

Dominic tells us first that he is orphaned.
He says his mother and father went
To farm in the fields one day,
But only his mother returned.
His voice cracks (and my heart breaks)
As he confides to us that he had to beg her
To tell him what happened.
(I blink several times to clear my vision.)
He swallows and says his mother’s story:
When they were tending to the crops
Rebels came towards them,
Repeatedly asking about their children.
His father says they have none.
He bravely tells the Rebels
To let them work now and turns away.
(Dominic’s face is marked
With clear rivers though dirt mountains
As he finishes the story.)
One of the Rebels grabbed the machete
From his father’s hands.
Before his mother could scream,
The Rebel had cut his father to pieces.
“Bury him now!”
The Rebel shouted at his mother.
“So she did and came home,”
Dominic concludes.
She made him and his brother
Sleep in the brush for several nights,
Fearing the Rebels would come
And take them.

Dominic continues his story
Stating that the Rebels did indeed come.
They took and killed his mother
And captured his brother too.
He is nervous today because he
Has heard of the capture of a Rebel
By a military camp nearby.
(The class watches motionless
And silent. I have no idea
How this will end so I hold my breath
For what feels like fifteen minutes.)

Dominic travels on foot the next morning,
Miles through the dangerous bush,
And speaks with a Lieutenant,
Requesting a moment with the Rebel.
The wish is granted.
He sits near his greatest enemy,
To ask a question.
“Have you seen my brother?
Is he still alive?”
They converse for a moment,
A tear runs down the boy’s face,
Streaking the dirt.
Dominic’s brother drove a bicycle taxi
And the Rebel confirms that
All drivers were killed.
It was orders.
He goes on to explain to the child
That each Rebel moves up in ranks
By capturing children or killing.
It builds the army’s strength, he says.
The boy thanks him,
And leaves.

(I cry silently now, with no shame.
This is horrible, I repeat in my head.
How can they live like this and we
Have no clue? How are we not told?)

The Acholi tribe children cling to music.
It brings them peace
In the face of war.
They practice singing and dance;
Some play instruments
Made of wood and strings.
Together, they dream of winning
The National Music Competition
In Kampala, a peaceful city.
For many, traveling to Kampala
It will be their first time
Out of war.

Before their journey, two days away from
The government protected camp,
The children receive matching uniforms
In royal blue and yellow.
Dominic scrubs his skin clean
With soap and water,
Before he puts his on.
Then he sits for hours in the hot sun,
Practicing his wooden xylophone.
He wants to be the best player.
(I smile in amazement at his skill,
Sending my best wishes into the screen.)

Rose packs her bag alone. Her aunt,
Who she now lives with,
Doesn’t want her to leave
Because Rose cares for her cousins.
But she wants to go, she assures us,
So she hums to herself
Her verses as she packs.
She wants to be the best singer.
(I admire her courage and wonder
At myself. If I could be that daring.)

As we watch the children of the Acholi tribe
Climb onto the trucks and busses,
Headed to compete in Kampala,
The village cheers and waves.
Though the children are all orphaned,
And living in a government-protected area,
Their shattered lives bring them together.
War brings them together.
The music teacher addresses them,
Assures them to be confident,
“This is not where our story ends.”

War Dance

The Rebels tear homes apart
As war rages in Uganda, Africa.
It leaves families destroyed,
Parents, brothers, sisters,
Relatives, separated. Alone.
People are forced to live
In government camps,
Overflowing, for safety.
We hear part of their testimonies.

A young girl named Rose
Tells her story to the camera…
She says she hid with siblings
In the bush outside her home,
While the Rebels grabbed her parents
From their bed, demanding to know
Where the children were.
Rose heard her mother deny
That she was such,
Before they were taken.
Three days later, the children
Were found by soldiers in the bush.
They begged and pleaded,
“Where are my parents?
Where is my mother?”
The soldiers took them to a tree
On the edge of the African horizon.
The group brought there, is told
To identify their relatives.
A soldier begins lifting heads
Out of a large cooking pot.
Rose falls crying as she sees her mother,
In a way no child should.

A young boy (name unknown)
Hears of the capture of a Rebel
By a military camp nearby.
He travels on foot one morning,
Miles through the dangerous bush,
And speaks with a Lieutenant,
Requesting a moment with the Rebel.
The wish is granted.
He sits near his greatest enemy,
To ask a question.
“Have you seen my brother?
Is he still alive?”
They converse for a moment,
A tear runs down the boy’s face,
Streaking the dirt.
His brother drove a bicycle taxi
And the Rebel confirms that
All drivers were killed.
It was orders.
He goes on to explain to the child
That each Rebel moves up in ranks
By capturing children or killing.
It builds the army, he says.
The boy thanks him,
And leaves.

The Acholi tribe children cling to music.
It brings them peace
In the face of war.
They practice singing and dance;
Some play instruments
Made of wood and strings.
Together, they dream of winning
The National Music Competition
In Kampala, a peaceful city.
For many, traveling to Kampala
It will be their first time
Out of war.

Before their journey, two days away from
The government protected camp,
The children receive matching uniforms
In royal blue and yellow.
The young boy scrubs his skin clean
With soap and water,
Before he puts his on.
Then he sits for hours in the hot sun,
Practicing his wooden xylophone.

As the children of the Acholi tribe
Climb onto the trucks and busses,
Headed to compete,
The village cheers and waves.
The music teacher addresses them,
Assures them to be confident.
“This is not where our story ends.”

The Calendars

There are calendars in our house
So we know which day it is.
Station day or home day?
Upstairs, in our bedroom,
Each number is color coded
On the calendar every three days
In three different shades:
Red, blue, green.
A shift, B shift, C shift.
My husband has been on A shift
Since we met six years ago.
He was promoted to Engineer
Over the summertime,
And transferred to a new station,
But he’s still on A shift.

Downstairs, the freezer door
Holds a dry erase board.
We wipe it clean each month,
Carefully writing the days
In black, always sure to add
The little red F’s in the bottom,
Right-hand corners.
Station day or home day?

Those red numbers and letter
Affect me as they do him.
So many questions are answered
By looking at the calendar.
Station day or home day?
Will I eat alone for breakfast,
Lunch and dinner, huddled
In the corner near the sink
Because the table is too big
To bare sit at alone?
Will my conversations go
Unanswered by the pets
Who keep me company?
Will I call my mom too much
To hear another voice
Who just gets it? Understands?
Will I sleep alone in the middle
Of a queen-sized empty bed?
Maybe, today is a station day.

My cell phone is life,
In multiple ways.
If it rings from a call or text,
It means he’s alive and ok, probably bored,
Cause it’s a slow day, this station day.
A quiet phone means calls,
The ones made over the radio
By a dispatcher requesting Engine 201,
Assistance needed. He’s driving.
To structure fires, wrecks with entrapment,
Brush fires, medical aid needed,
The list goes on and on.
So do my worries.

When I meet new people,
Who ask me what I do,
I’m not sure how to answer them.
I attend College of Charleston, yes,
And I work part time at a pizza place, yes,
But the biggest responsibility I have,
I signed on for in May.
I am a firefighter’s wife.
I depend on the calendar.
Station day or home day?

Station one sometimes gets lonely,
He tells me this.
It’s a small station, manned
Only by a handful of firefighters.
They each have separate living space,
Which is a big deal.
They all eat at the same time
And watch movies together at night,
But during the day, on a slow day,
They part ways to entertain themselves.
We talk for a bit, about the past
And our future, and I don’t mind it so much,
The station days.

I never thought I’d be married
And in college at the same time.
The plan, my plan,
Always was college first,
Then a good, well-paying job,
Marriage and family.
So I did it a little out of order.
So what? Plans change.
I am so very proud of us,
Of my husband and all he does,
Of all the support I didn’t know
That I had to give.
Of all we manage to squeeze
Into our lives, onto our calendars.
We live our lives by the calendars,
The shaded numbers and red f’s.
I forget, is tomorrow
A station day or a home day?

Goodbye in Caviar & Banana's

Scene by Mandy & Brandon
INT CAVIAR & BANANAS – LUNCH TIME

PEOPLE ARE MILLING AROUND LOOKING AT MENUS IN VARIOUS PARTS OF THE SHOP. A PAIR OF MEN SIT NEAR THE WINE RACK SPEAKING IN A FOREIGN TONGUE, DEBATING SOMETHING, GESTURING. BARISTAS STRAIGHTEN THE DISPLAY RACKS AND JARS, HELPING CUSTOMERS FIND THE CORRECT ORDER. CHEFS IN THE REAR OF THE STORE CALL OUT ORDER NUMBERS AS THEY ARE PREPARED. IT IS THE LAST DAY OF CLASSES AT COLLEGE OF CHARLESTON AND SAMANTHA HAS JUST FINISHED PACKING TO GO ON A BACKPACKING TRIP TO ALASKA BUT SHE IS MEETING HER BEST FRIEND, GEORGE, WHO IS MOVING TO NEW YORK TO WORK BEFORE GRAD SCHOOL, AT CAVIAR & BANANAS FIRST.

SAMANTHA IS ALREADY HOLDING HER CAVIAR & BANANA WRAP AND BRAND WATER BOTTLE. SHE IS LOOKING FOR A COUNTER SPACE TO EAT. GEORGE COMES IN.

GEORGE:
Wow, you already ordered. That was fast. I thought we were eating together?

SAMANTHA:
We are, but I have to catch my plane soon. A month in Alaska George! I’m so excited but I have no idea what I’ll need so I’ve packed everything.

GEORGE:
Definitely add something warm. I Googled last night for you, cause I know you wouldn’t, and the high right now in Alaska is 24 degrees.

STUNNED, SAMANTHA SITS QUIETLY FOR A MOMENT.

SAMANTHA:
A high of 24? Maybe I should’ve gone to New Zealand.

GEORGE:
No, you wanted to see the polar bears and Northern Lights remember? All the pictures you wanted to take?

SAMANTHA:
Yeah, but 24 is cold. Anyway, did you talk to your roommates yet? You were supposed to Skype with them yesterday right?

GEORGE IS MOVING IN THREE DAYS AND FOUND ROOMMATES ON CRAIGSLIST WHOM HE’S NEVER MET TO SHARE THE APARTMENT HE’S RENTING.

GEORGE:
I was supposed to yeah, but the power went out on their block to we couldn’t. I’ll be meeting them in three days anyway so it’s ok. I’m sure it’ll be fine.

SAMANTHA:
Go get something to eat and I’ll grab the counter by the window that just freed up.

GEORGE:
Ok, I’ll be right back.

SAMANTHA SITS IN FRONT OF THE WINDOW AND BEGINS TO EAT HER WRAP AS GEORGE GOES TO GET APPLE JUICE AND THE CHEESE TOASTIE. WHEN HE RETURNS, HE SITS ON SAMANTHA’S LEFT AND SPOTS THE BICYCLERS WHO JUST STOPPED OUTSIDE.

GEORGE:
Oh my gosh. Those guys would make Lance Armstrong proud.

SAMANTHA:
Seriously! All those bright colors and look at his crazy helmet!

GEORGE:
Stop giggling! They’re coming in.

THEY TRY TO KEEP STRAIGHT FACES AS TWO BRIGHTLY DRESSED BIKERS COME IN WEARING EXTREMELY TIGHT SPANDEX CLOTHING, HOLDING THEIR SPECIALLY DESIGNED AERODYNAMIC HELMETS.

SAMANTHA:
I have got to get a picture! Tell me when he’s not looking.

GEORGE EVER SO CASUALLY TURNS AND PEEKS AT THE MENU IN FRONT OF THE BIKERS.

GEORGE:
Take it now! They’re paying for whatever they got.

SAMANTHA SNEAKS HER PHONE OVER HER SHOULDER AND SNAPS A QUICK PHOTO.

SAMANTHA:
Rebecca would never believe this unless I got a photo.

GEORGE:
Don’t you think it’s funny that you and your sister trade weird photos instead of just talking to each other?

SAMANTHA:
No. It’s just the kind of relationship we have.

HAVING FINISHED THEIR LUNCHES, GEORGE AND SAMANTHA PAUSE REALIZING SHE IS ABOUT TO GET ON A PLANE AND FLY ACROSS THE COUNTRY IN JUST A FEW HOURS.

GEORGE:
Do you need some help getting to the airport? I can give you a ride? Help you on the plane?

SAMANTHA:
Actually, yes. That would be great. I hadn’t figured how I was getting there yet.

GEORGE:
Of course you hadn’t.

SAMANTHA:
Well, don’t be mean. You offered after all. I can’t believe how many times I have to change flights.

THEY STAND UP AND GATHER THEIR TRASH BUT GEORGE PAUSES BEFORE WALKING TO THE CAN.

GEORGE:
I’m gonna miss your ditzyness.

SAMANTHA:
I’m gonna miss… just you. You help me keep my life in order George.

GEORGE:
I know.

HE SMILES AND WALKS TOWARD THE DOOR HOLDING IT OPEN FOR HER. THEY WALK DOWN THE STREET TOWARD SAMANTHA’S APARTMENT.

Let’s go put your crap in the Subaru. How many suitcases did you pack?

SAMANTHA:
One giant backpack… and a few smaller ones.

GEORGE:
And you have no plans as to where you’re gonna stay?

SAMANTHA:
Nope, not after the first three nights. That’s what makes it fun though! It wouldn’t be backpacking if I stayed in hotels the whole month.

GEORGE:
True. Just be careful. And let me know when you get to know Connecticut in June or July.

SAMANTHA:
You know I will. I’ll want to show you all my pictures of polar bears and lights.

END SCENE

George Street Observer Opinion Article

What’s the deal with textbooks?
The background information you may not know

As a College of Charleston student, I have spent a few thousand on school textbooks in the last three years. My freshman year, my family, unknowingly of the loopholes of the internet bookstores, purchased all of my books from the campus bookstore for a shocking $800. At times I have been required to purchase as many as seven books for one class, only to be told at the end of the semester that little or none of them are being bought back since newer editions have been printed. Buying my textbooks this semester, I wondered why they cost so much, where the money goes, and why doesn’t the campus just cut out the middle man (the bookstore) and supply students with books like in middle and high schools?

Using my own textbook purchases as an average example, a fifteen hour or full time student pays around $200 a semester for textbooks. Taking a moment to do the math, anyone would realize that the school makes a ton of money from the bookstore purchases. Who determines the cost of textbooks is generally the publishers but why prices vary from store to internet store specifically is unknown. Barns and Noble Bookstore Manager Rebecca Gray notes, “In addition to all aspects of textbooks, we provide school supplies, dorm room supplies, gift items, school spirit clothing and a general reading section (for the students).”

But where does the money from those purchases go? “The Bookstore has been involved in charitable organizations in the Charleston community and we contribute to the College of Charleston's scholarship and athletic programs,” Gray says. I suppose if students wanted their money to go anywhere it would be back into the school they attend. Orientation programs, graduation, the College Reads program, homecoming, family weekend, student government and admissions events are all partially, if not fully, funded by money the bookstore brings in.

I personally feel that since all college students are now paying for their education, unlike public high schools, some items, such as textbooks, should be included with the tuition. It would be pretty simple for the bookstore to act as a supervisor in the distribution of textbooks at the start of the semester according to an individual’s class schedule and collect them at the end, instead of buying them back. If students don’t return the books, they’d be charged a credit against the school to be paid back before graduation. Though the bookstore has returned “roughly $600,000 in cash” to CofC students in the last two buy-back cycles according to Gray, many books were denied purchase because they weren’t on the retail buyback program which holds a list from professors requesting a certain book for their class the next semester. Gray mentions that she requests professors reuse older editions and send in their list as soon as possible to help the process.

The new Barnes and Noble bookstore at CofC has added a rental program to the College that is in some cases cheaper than renting or buying online. Rentals from any location are a student’s best friend because they cost less and avoid the process of selling books back. “This has proven to be a very popular option with our students,” Gray says.

Amanda Graham - Opinions Columnist

A Valentine's Bouquet

There must be fifteen purple roses
Nestled neatly into that vase.
Matured and fat, the deep, wide petals
Open upon each other layer over layer,
The moss green stems trimmed slimly,
Soft to the touch, free of harsh thorns.

They contrast sharply when added to
The bright, freckled white lilies,
A few still closed in tight bulbs,
Creating a clean canvas for colors.
The few spread flowers flow, pointing,
In many different directions.

Voluptuous pink peonies are crowded in
Fighting for space and water.
The ample blossoms in faded cherry
Seem to infringe against the clear glass.
The misshapen blades draw the eye,
Daring it to find the center.

Last to enter the tall crystal holder,
Are sunshine shaded daisies.
Like melted butter, they blend in
And compose the bouquet with
An even blend of colors
Fitting for any Valentine.

The Pontiac, Toyota & Honda

Pulling into my driveway, I pause in thought.
Staring at the deep gray leather steering wheel
With the little divots designed for better gripping,
I reach out and trace the silver H centered over the horn.
I realize that I have spent a large chunk of my life,
Many hours totaling into days and more, in a vehicle.

As a kid I most noticed the fabric covered seats –
With the very intricate stitching,
Almost like the string had woven together
In some slow gliding, perfect waltz –
Or the hard material the doors were made of,
Whether my toy car could zoom on the armrest ledge.

The windows in the Pontiac van were always tinted and clean –
“Don’t put fingerprints on my clean windows!” –
Showing mostly the blue sky from such a low angle.
Seatbelts clicked into place before the gears shifted
And there was no fighting with siblings allowed,
(But it happened in quiet, twisted faces until one tattled.)

When I became a teenager, the gas gage and speedometer
Were all I bothered to study because both could, and would,
Get me into trouble from time to time in my Toyota SUV.
Driving around the school parking lot,
All the windows down with the radio and bass turned up,
Meant you were somebody important, somebody with wheels.

Wheels I spent every other Saturday afternoon polishing:
Cleaning black from the cracks in the rims before I shined the tires,
Vacuuming the dirt from friend’s shoes out of the dark carpet,
Dusting the dashboard free of dog hair and lint,
Washing the paint free of mud and waxing it in circles,
So that next week it would look good for a date.

I am silently grateful I have the big Honda SUV as an adult.
I’ve spent a large chunk of my life in family vehicles
But now I have the ability to choose the style that fits me.
I sit up high in fabric bucket seats, looking out the tinted windshield,
Behind sturdy doors painted a bright orange,
Watching the gas gage and speedometer closely.

After the groceries had been unloaded from the SUV in the driveway –
Where they had been stacked behind seats that will one day
Hold my own silent, face-making children,
Who will ride in many different vehicles themselves –
I stop, milk in my left hand, the fridge door handle in my right,
Trying to remember, When is the last time I had the oil changed?

Baby ducks

Almost can't believe I made my little friends to be eaten. :)

Pie Anyone??

Super easy to make Cherry and Berry Pies! Easy to make with extra cupcakes from other recipes!

Hello Cupcake! (part 2)

Hello Cupcake!

So, everyone knows I sometimes spend hours baking. I bake for family occations, friends requests, neighbors as thank yous, and firemen. But to those of you who haven't yet seen some of my creations... Here are the fuzzy monsters I made tonight. :) {Be aware Josh's photography is creative}