At the Center of Every Fear

I wrote htis on 11/4/24, the day befroe the eleciton. The title is the prompt line that James Crews posted on FB after his poem of the day on 11/4. Now, after the election the words still hold true for me.

At the Center of Every Fear

…there is Worry –

Fear’s snotty sibling

that pokes you awake from sleep,

then ruins a perfectly good day.

At the center of every fear

you will meet What If,

its game face competes with peace.

What If faces you head on,

hands on hips, huffing anxiety,

every whisper, a dire possibility.

At the center of every Fear

is Not Knowing,

a poker-faced chap who

holds secrets,

and hoards answers,

about the heartbeat,

the biopsy, the fever,

black ice on the road,

or shooters at schools.

Fear often hangs out in your stomach

Along with Worry, What If, and Not Knowing –

together they beat their chests,

wag their arms for your attention.

They will waste your time

with needless noise.

You have the power

to usher them out.

Grab What If’s anxiety by its breath –

take slow inhales, go deep within,

make an O with your lips

release them in a slow-motion exhale:

Not Knowing, first,

then What If.

Next, exhale Worry

and finally say goodbye to Fear.

Send them on their way,

“It’s a beautiful day

but it’s not going to get worse”

      Annette Langlois Grunseth. 11/4/2024

Seems Like My Kind of Heaven

From this summer’s-fall’s Art SPeaks I jotted random lines down that others shared from their free wirtes. I created a Cento to share on Sunday at the Art SPeaks Reading. It was FUN to do. I edited and changed some of the words to fit (revised pronouns, singulars and plurals)

Seems Like My Kind of Heaven

(A Cento from Art Speaks poets, season 2024)

In the cavern of our creation,

rub the brow of the edge,

walk against the current,

a contrast of bruising up against

chaos in order, order in chaos.

The meeting is in the moment,

the unknown beyond our kingdom,

a frigid isolation of everything

fading into sallow alleys,

wherever we’ve been bent out of shape,

backs against the cool wall —

shoulders worn by work.

Send it somewhere else,

to someone else’s bones.

Meander the stream of ashes

gentle, like ripples –

Let dreams play in our fuzzy heads,

hopelessly exhausted,

startled by the circle of white.

Allies, close, adversaries closer,

cousins of the same coin.

The scent slips in like a shadowed visitor.

Let it be not what it is, but what it should be,

this thickness of light,

a glass blown moment,

alive in our keeping,

the symmetry of our intersections,

a kind of linen gathered up in a fold

like the kindness of grandmother’s gingham.

Her fingers of light saturated with peace,

alive in our keeping.

Dance in this light of familiar space.

Born a needle with your love,

spread kindness like a shaft of sunlight.

Wow us when we are wilted,

not in labored breath

but as a howl,

a cry for life.

Today, Just Today

The next Moss Piglet, due in a few days; theme is “The Future”. I wrote this upon returning home last week learning of two deaths in the past 7 days ( along with other deaths this year that are each weighing on me.) I welcome your thoughts on this one also.

Today, Just Today

The river of memory

rushes onward

to a distant destination

pooled in my mind –

all the places I’ve been

and where I still want to go.

Oh, to stop. Here, now,

to dangle my feet

from the mossy bank of today,

red maples arched over me,

a crisp blue sky.

Let this cold water

rush over my tired feet.

Let me breathe –

breathe in

the season of now.

I want to tame

the eddy of time,

slow the swirl of it all –

the passing away

of days,

and people.

Hold the future distant

as a purpled mountain,

a horizon far away.

I am not yet ready.

Let me linger longer,

one more day,

one more week,

one more year.

Rugosa Rose

I need a poem to share from Art SPeaks from last summer for a Nov. 3 reading at Write On. I took a free write of a memory, and crafted this poem. What do you think? Is the last line too “hoky?” sentimenal? I could dorp the last line? in line 3 should I say “a bedroom window” to shorten?

Rugosa Rose

(Art Speaks, The Garden Door June 21, 2024))

Rugosa rose, magenta,

grew tall and full at the outside corner

of my brother’s bedroom window.

and the dining room.

Sun-warmed scent wafted

through the windows at dinnertime.

That rose bush grew as unruly as we kids

who ran free on summer days.

Coiled behind this gangly shrub,

we tugged the green garden hose out to the yard.

One of us squeezed behind those dense prickers

to turn the mini-wheeled faucet wide open.

Thorns caught a shirt, snagged the skin,

a gash of blood trickled down an arm,

soon red-crusted by the sun.

Water on full blast, the hose gushed into our mouths,

a faint taste of rubber with the aroma of rose

in the bloom of our youth.

Nature of Love

This was a fun prompt… I originally wrote it “my love”… and then changed to “my man” (how the Scottish talk about husbands).

From WRITE IT!
Surrealist poet André Breton wrote a list poem "Freedom of Love" that described his wife with wrists of matches...with buttocks of swans' backs... with eyes of water to be drunk in prison. Think of a beloved, or maybe just your first crush. Now describe them in a list that plays fast and loose, associating not for sense but for feeling.

After André Breton

My man with the forest walk, attuned to the whitetail, blue jay,
silk-furred mole
My man with the hush talk bounding fawn
surprise
My man with the leaf hands, veined and possible,
cascading flutter and touch, dexterous to the ax and awl
My man with the face of an otter, scritching tic swim family,
frisky whiskers
My man with the hard nut face of an acorn crosshatched cupule,
legacied and lithe
My man with the cantina eyes of blue tile stone,
skipped across the hairbreadth
My man with the scent of bark's husk musk
My man with the gasp of neck fin
My man with mowed grass amazement
My man with the hipless Lycra stretch
My man with the shoe drop utterances scattering
birds
My man with legs squared to the watertower
My man with panhandle feet
My man with the cap-wearing airlessness,
scrim stubble, uncanny canopy,
arboreal dreams

White Whale Speaks

[This is my poem for Moss Piglet, due this Wednesday— Theme: Moby Dick]

"He is, without doubt, the largest inhabitant of the globe; the most formidable of all whales to encounter; the most majestic in aspect…” – Herman Melville

White Whale Speaks

Ishmael, be aware, you are a guest in my house.

My domain spans the two-thirds of the earth that is water.

Some say I am God, mysterious,

majestic, formidable,

uncatchable.

I am the largest inhabitant of the globe.

Yet, I breathe air like you do.

We both love the sea.

Like you, I have a voice, language, and a heart.

Even if I look imposing, I seek to do no harm.

Why your vendetta? Has fate pushed you

to conquer and destroy me?

Why don’t you go after that skiff over there,

the one with the Old Man

fighting a Marlin that is longer than his boat!

Help him battle those sharks

that attack, gnaw, and consume his catch.

Go! Thrash and harpoon over there.

The Old Man’s hands are raw

and bloody, heaving on that line.

For two nights and two days

he worked that fish

and finally —

lashed it to his boat.  

He is exhausted. Spent. Drained.

He could use a crew like yours –

give him the muscle of your obsession.

For heaven’s sake,

help the Old Man

and just leave me alone.

I stopped to dig out a stone from the heel of my sandal

Weirdly this poem came from this prompt from WRITE IT:

Poet Dorianne Laux compared falling in love with accidentally being doused with gasoline while working at a gas station: Light-headed, scrubbed raw, I felt / pure and amazined--the way the amber gas glazed my flesh, the searing / subterranean pain of it, ho wmy skin / shimmered and ached, glowed / like rainbowed oil on the pavement. Try, if you can, to compare the experience of falling in love with something complete unromantic, even ugly or dangerous.

We walked across the train tracks at the end of the dead-end road on our way to the Pumphouse, a bar we all went to. The dance floor was lighted and, reliably, three young women could inspire a bartender to buy drinks—sloe gin fizzes, Tequila sunrises—whatever we were drinking that we could nurse for hours with only coins in our pockets. We were celebrating my new job at a famous deli named for its founder—Max's or Maurice's—and known for specialties like bear claw, pastrami and German potato salad.

The railroad ties split in the summer sun, the signal arm silent in the gathering gloom of a dusk that promised the Hustle and Electric Slide. I stopped to dig out a stone from the heel of my sandal. My friends waited for me on the other side of a barricade where a weed-plagued sidewalk led to Grand Avenue. A conflagration erupted across the street. We flinched at the screech of an overheating metal roof, our faces a campfire of flickering flame and shadow, glowing barrettes and make-up shimmer. The deli was on fire. A mill of pedestrians and firefighters turned away as windows exploded, glass shattering in a shower of shards. The air sizzled with smoke and fat and sugar, a skirmish of smells I still associate with catastrophe.

Endings especially got up my nose with a hair-stirring oversensitivity. The three of us wouldn't remain friends after college. I wasn't prepared for the disappointment at the potluck of their decisions. Or was it me? Smoldering with the worse kind of luck, left to walk home alone, stuck in the gesture of removing a pebble from the softness underfoot?

Safely Through Another Week

Here is my possible poem for Triad: Ekphrastic Theme. I wrote the poem, and then read the explanation. I edited some after reading it. I am glad I waited to read the explanation. I didn’t catch the guy with the booger til afterward. It could’ve been a very different poem then, ;-). “Hand picked” perhaps? HA

Safely Through Another Week”

      After the painting “Jesus Exalted in Song,” by Ben Shahn (1898-1969),  Milwaukee Museum, Narratives, page 5

The maker is in the music.

We show up Sunday, disheveled, disjointed

until we open our music.

Our chests swell with bellowed breath.

The black and white notes

on the page map the way.

The lyric is the journey,

the text crescendos to a chant

knowing there is something bigger

than squabbles.

Our voices memorize the mysterious.

The power of our parts is a chorus,

an antidote to argument.

Our music dissolves discord.

We exhale harmony.    

We sing to save our warring world.

We sing to save the children

caught in the crossfire.

We sing a shared rhythm

a collective song

a communion,

a co-existence,

a creative calm.

Singing this one moment

this one time

for all time.

 REVISION 08-06-2024

Safely Through Another Week

      After the painting “Jesus Exalted in Song,” by Ben Shahn (1898-1969), Milwaukee Museum, Narratives, page 5

The maker is in the music.

We show up Sunday morning

disheveled, disjointed

until we open our music.

Our chests swell with bellowed breath.

The black and white notes

on the page map the way.

The lyric is the journey

the text crescendos to a chant

that there is something

bigger than squabbles.

Our voices memorize the mysterious.

The power of our parts is a chorus,

an antidote to argument.

Our music dissolves discord.

We exhale harmony.    

We sing to save

our warring world.

We sing to save the children

caught in the crossfire.

We sing a collective song

a communion,

a co-existence,

a creative calm.

Singing this one moment

this one time

for all time.

Woman and Child (or High Fidelity)

Annette, this is an ekphrastic poem—hopefully for the theme category of the Triad contest. I am including the image, too.

The child wasn't real.
I moved my sleight of hand.
The slow cruise of late afternoon
chased aquamarine shadow to the paneled corners.
The photographer told me not to look at the camera.
Could I say I wished the child was mine?
Posing on the floor was a kind of art.
The child's feet broke my heart.
My left thigh was numb.
I pretended to move a piece of the puzzle.
Each piece was a tiny artifact.
My womb was a stubborn satchel.
The prop of my arm grew tired.
The photographer wooed me with the veracity question.
I was beguiled by the hand-knotting.
Already the girl practiced the downward gaze.
I had it down—
probably why the photographer
chose me.

Maja & Elodie by Sharon Lockhart, Milwaukee Art Museum

Lines Written Post-Disaster

Annette, I wrote this poem in response to prompt #1 of the Academy’s Summer Songs.

After Eduardo C. Corral

Heartbreak sings like charred meat.
The smell of heartbreak hinges doubt.
Heartbreak can't take a joke.
The heaviness of heartbreak sludges your step.
Heartbreak smokes, singeing the edges.
Heartbreak and regret are cousins.
The squawk of crows signals heartbreak.
The taste of heartbreak is licorice on your tongue.
Lilies sift a pollen of heartbreak.
Just give heartbreak a call.
Heartbreak remembers everything.
Loops of heartbreak pucker the paisley.
Heartbreak interrogates with a stiff arm.
You sputter at heartbreak, lowing the ditty.

Wistful

WISTFUL

  After “Wistful” Mixed Media by Lauren Douglas. (Art Speaks, Woodwalk Gallery 06/28/24)

There is yearning in her eyes

with an aura of melancholy.

It began at age ten

fidgeting with her shadow.

She would not step on it,

something bad might happen.

To be safe, she counted

steps forward and backward,

but not in the shadow.

Even the air hurt to breathe,

Something didn’t feel right.

Do it again. Count the steps.

Hold in breath,

do not breathe the bad air.

Shower away the germs

until the water runs cold.

She was born a boy

so the doctor said

but she thinks like a girl,

hormones criss-crossed

somewhere, maybe in the womb?

She’s grown into her real self.

She yearns, the time is almost here

to glow up into that feeling when ….

She walks into light

wears the yellow of sunshine,

re-birthed into a wish fulfilled.

She looks forward

worry lines relax.

Lips calm, with a slight upturn

poised to smile,

all girl now, no one can tell.

She never has to go back.

Revised version 7/23/24: I changed to 3rd person. I took out “telling” lines—at least I hope I did.  I struggle with that. added more info about the transition. I tried one long block of text, then settled on couplets. Couplets add pauses, I think. Do the couplets make it too long on the page?

  Glow-up

  After “Wistful” Mixed Media by Lauren Douglas. (Art Speaks, Woodwalk Gallery 06/28/24)

It began at age ten

fidgeting with your shadow.

You would not step on it,

something bad might happen.

You counted steps forward

and backward

but not in the shadow.

Even the air hurt to breathe.

Something didn’t feel right.

Do it again. Count the steps.

Hold in breath

do not breathe the bad.

Shower it away  

until the water runs cold.

You were born a boy

but think like a girl.

Hormones criss-crossed

maybe in the womb?

Too much of one

not enough of the other?

The glacial pace of transition

is the gender of rightness.

Now glow up into light

wear the yellow of sunshine, smile!

Certain as the cycle of seasons

you have no second thoughts.

Be safe, my child

no one can tell

You never have to go back.

All girl now.

 REVISION 2

Glow-Up

  After “Wistful” Mixed Media by Lauren Douglas. (Woodwalk Gallery, Egg Harbor,  06/28/24)

It begins at age ten,

fidgeting with your shadow.

You won’t step on it,

something bad might happen.

You count steps forward

and backward

but not in the shadow.

Even the air hurts to breathe.

Something doesn’t feel right.

Do it again. Count the steps.

You hold in your breath,

to not breathe in the bad.

Shower it away 

until the water runs cold.

You are born a boy

but think like a girl.

Have hormones crisscrossed –

maybe in the womb?

Too much of one

not enough of the other?

The glacial pace of transition

is the gender of rightness.

Now glow-up into light.

You are your radiance. Smile.

Certain as the cycle of seasons

you have no second thoughts.

Be safe, my child,

no one can tell.

 
You never have to go back.

All girl now.

An Exacerbation of Dying (NEW)

Is this a prose poem sequence? Or does it need to be something else?

Mother teased the shortness of breath. How many rests did it take for her to get ready? Leaning hard on her elbows in the bathroom, struggling to inhale past the destruction of her lungs? Greenery was color of the year in 2017, a verdant yellow-green she wore in a stone around her neck, her granddaughter, too, in a thrifted sweater, squeezed next to her at the kitchen counter. Their dark heads together, they snarked at the expense of father, grandfather, husband. How hyper he got when they used to travel. Mother said words like "hyper." Father took it on the chin, drinking a can of Bud, attending mother and her portable oxygen, set on high.

Mother and granddaughter mocked other things besides the slapstick of far-away destinations—sequins, wide-legged trousers, ottoman poufs. They had opinions. I eavesdropped while I cooked the Thanksgiving feast, basting the turkey, mashing the potatoes. The heat and steam of my small kitchen conducted memory. What I chose to remember. What I chose to forget. Mother closed her eyes when she wheezed. I fixed her a whisky and seven-up, which she only sipped and let melt to watery soda by the time I called everyone to the dining table. A napkin stuck to the bottom of her glass with condensation. She didn't like wetness in her palm.

Mother ate everything. Turkey, mashed potatoes, sweet potato brulee, sausage dressing, pear salad. Her son-in-law joked, "Leave some for the rest of us." She fixed him with a stern eye and commandeered the homemade cranberry sauce, which only she and I appreciated. My husband and nephews pined for canned cranberry, jiggling with aluminium ripples. I sat next to her while she finished her pumpkin pie, scrapping the plate, whipped cream in the corner of her mouth. She nodded, full of the day. I leaned into her. "How are you feeling?" She closed her eyes. Wheezing episodes were called exacerbations. I could hear the wreckage of her airways. A sickly green entered her eyes.

"I can't breathe," she husked. Father stood, bumping the table, checking to see if the oxygen tube was kinked. She wanted to go home. She wanted to go home right now. She passed out in the back hallway, swooning on the boot bench. The oxygen tube dislodged. Briefly, she wasn't fighting for air. Father drove. My brother held the oxygen tube in her nose. She revived when they hooked her up to the house oxygen. Should they have taken her to the hospital? Father helped her change into her nightgown. She said she felt fine. She said they should watch football. Later, when my brother returned to his family, she asked father to lay in bed with her.

"Mom, mom," my daughter insisted me out of sleep. I was confused by the dark. I was confused by my daughter silhouetted in the doorway. "Grandma died." She pulled at the green sweater she'd worn to bed. A tumbling of thoughts as I stared at her in a stupor. "We need to go to your dad's," said my husband. "Get ready." We arrived with the ambulance. My brother was already there. The paramedics were sliding out a gurney. Father wrung his hands, an expression I'd never understood before. I looked past the gruesomeness of mother's gaping mouth. I imagined she was sleeping. I imagined she'd incidentally let flop the mouthpiece of her oxygen tube.

+++

Annette’s suggestions: my comments in [ bold italics ]

What a deep and powerful essay. Excellent piece or writing, Tori
I think this would work well as a haibun, where you can insert several haiku to emphasize each part of the story. Are there parallels you can make in short stanzas at the breaks? I suggested paragraph breaks because I think the reader needs to catch their breath—like your mother can’t—in each section. See below

for the title —I don’t think you don’t need to give away the dying, it’s the deeply sad turn at the end. How about “An Exacerbation?”

Mother teased the shortness of breath. How many rests did it take for her to get ready? Leaning hard on her elbows in the bathroom, struggling to inhale past the destruction of her lungs? [should this be a period instead of a question? ]
[start a new paragraph]
Greenery was [C]olor of the [Y]ear in 2017, a verdant yellow-green she wore in a stone around her neck, her granddaughter, too, in a thrifted sweater, squeezed next to her at the kitchen counter.
[new paragraph—new thought]
Their dark heads together, they snarked at the expense of father, grandfather, husband. How hyper he got when they used to travel. [who used to travel—your parents or gma and Bella?]Mother said words like "hyper." Father took it on the chin, drinking a can of Bud, attending [to] mother and her portable oxygen, set on high. [good image, high.

Mother and granddaughter mocked other things besides the slapstick of far-away destinations [this seems out of place with the 70s attire words—clarify perhaps? or just say fashions of the 70s — travels of your parents or gma and Bella? or, do you need it? ]—sequins, wide-legged trousers, ottoman poufs. They had opinions. I eavesdropped while I cooked the Thanksgiving feast, basting the turkey, mashing the potatoes. The heat and steam of my small kitchen conducted memory. What I chose to remember. What I chose to forget. [good summary—normal family time, yet something is brewing here]

[insert haiku here—holiday-normal]

[new paragraph]
Mother closed her eyes when she wheezed. I fixed her a whisky and seven-up, which she only sipped and let melt to watery soda by the time I called everyone to the dining table. A napkin stuck to the bottom of her glass with condensation. She didn't like wetness in her palm.

Mother ate everything. Turkey, mashed potatoes, sweet potato brulee, sausage dressing, pear salad. Her son-in-law joked, "Leave some for the rest of us." She fixed him with a stern eye and commandeered the homemade cranberry sauce, which only she and I appreciated. My husband and nephews pined for canned cranberry, jiggling with aluminium [aluminum ]ripples. [love this detail!] I sat next to her while she finished her pumpkin pie, scrapping [did you mean scraping?] the plate, whipped cream in the corner of her mouth. She nodded, full of the day. I leaned into her. "How are you feeling?" She closed her eyes. Wheezing episodes were called exacerbations. I could hear the wreckage of her airways [good line!]. A sickly green entered her eyes. [I like how you come back to the color green again, only this time it’s serious]

"I can't breathe," she husked [good verb]. Father stood, bumping the table, checking to see if the oxygen tube was kinked. She wanted to go home. She wanted to go home right now.
[new paragraph—adds drama]
She passed out in the back hallway, swooning on the boot bench. The oxygen tube dislodged. Briefly, she wasn't fighting for air. Father drove. My brother held the oxygen tube in her nose. She revived [at home] when they hooked her up to the house oxygen.
[new paragraph—we the reader—need to “catch our breath” as we read; it’s a heavy story ]

[insert another haiku here]

Should they have taken her to the hospital? Father helped her change into her nightgown. She said she felt fine. She said they should watch football. Later, when my brother returned to his family, she asked father to lay in bed with her.

"Mom, Mom," my daughter insisted me out of sleep. I was confused by the dark. I was confused by my daughter silhouetted in the doorway. "Grandma died." She pulled at the green sweater she'd worn to bed. A tumbling of thoughts as I stared at her in a stupor. "We need to go to your dad's," said my husband. "Get ready." We arrived with the ambulance. My brother was already there. The paramedics were sliding out a gurney. Father wrung his hands, an expression I'd never understood before. I looked past the gruesomeness of mother's gaping mouth.

[can you turn these last lines into a final modified haiku?] or even compare to something nature] my sample haiku needs tweaking but you get the idea. It does NOT have to be 5-7-5.

I imagined she was sleeping.
Imagined she'd let flop the mouthpiece
of her oxygen tube.

[— Good job, Tori, this had to be hard to write, yet I hope it was healing too.

ALG]

Lost and Found (REWRITE)

I found what looked like a key
on a dusty shoulder
of a country road.

It felt natural in my hand,
stamped out of metal
with a looped eye,

the blade vaguely Egyptian.
It crumbled against my thumb
with age and rust.

A key would be useful
to unlock the disorder
of my son’s mind.

Wind blew in tiny coils.
Birds cried into the spiraling.
Anxiety raised my hackles.

I felt a tin can clatter
in my chest, a coat wire mangle
through the widest part

of my back. I stepped past
orange caution flags
marking future groundwork

that was also hidden
from me in a complex
infrastructure.

Dread knocked
on the clouds, clumping
an ominous gray.

Rain spit. I was out
of answers. The key
wasn’t really a key.

Dad's Vise

This started out in short-lined stanzas but I think it’s better as a Haibun with so much descriptive material. This is for “Moss Piglet,” theme issue: Tools. I have GREAT photos to go of his lures that are works of art. My other photos are colorful, I couldn’t add more than one image.

Dad’s Vise

The cigar-sized metal barrel narrowed to a silver cone at one end with serrated grooves. This miniature jaw could hold the smallest fish hook for tying handmade flies.

Lock-cammed to another rod and tilted toward Dad, it was C-clamped to an old door laid across two file cabinets in the basement rec room. After a long day at the office, he’d unwind at home after dinner, settling at his makeshift bench.

Shoeboxes, light as air, held feathers, while others, smelling of mothballs, were stuffed with deer tails dyed red, yellow, white, and black, stacked next to him. Wooden spools of silver and gold thread lined up like soldiers across the bench.

With precision, he’d snip strands from a bucktail, select a feather, and secure a fish hook in the vise’s teeth. He'd pinch a tuft of fur, and add a feather to the shaft of the hook, winding metallic thread around and around in stripes to mimic a fly hatch or minnow. Half-hitches fastened the thread, he trimmed the fur to shape the lure, and on some lures, added a coat of nail polish on one end to finish it. He created Digger-Jiggers, Spinners, Poppers, and every size Mayfly to match the hatch, including Nymphs.

He took art classes to learn sketching and designed catalogs of his lures, selling them to fishermen around the world.

His vise a virtue
each hand-tied lure
a catch of art.

Unconditional Love

Tori, this is a draft of the essay James Crews requested for his LGBTQ Love Poems anthology. He said 300-500 words. This is a 620. I went over. I trimmed it down to 680 words. I would like to take out more words but each section is needed. I need honest feedback. he wants it submitted by April 15.

Unconditional Love

The first time I heard your heartbeat, when I felt that first flutter in my tummy ­-- was that a kick? I was in awe, in love. An actual human being was growing inside me. Such comfort that nine months, feeling I was never alone.

An April day, as the world was reawakening, you entered as new life itself. Our first born; pushed, birthed, born…into my arms.

Where did you come from? Two lives became three and love multiplied with this soul of the universe.

Growing into a curious, creative child you asked profound questions at age three and were spellbound by the stars when you and dad laid on a blanket in the backyard looking at the Milky Way. When you were eight, we gave you glow-in-the-dark stars; you arranged them in the correct constellations on your ceiling.

At age ten anxiety began inside you, the source of which you did not know, nor did we. The unrest continued. We sought help. Yet, you carried on through high school and college excelling with honors in spite of angst gnawing at you. You married your soulmate right out of college. There were happy days and deeply depressed days. We worried.

We were gathered in the family room one day in September; you said you had news. You sat on the floor in jeans and a t-shirt. We noticed your hair was longer on top, getting curly. We noticed your face was softer and calmer, you looked happier.

You handed us a letter. We read silently as you watched. As we read, a bolt of electricity went through us — This has been a long time coming, I identify as a woman.

We were stunned into silence. How did we miss the signs? After all, you weren’t the first transgender person we knew.

You interrupted the silence with, Can I have a hug?

Of course! Yes, we are so happy for you.

In a role reversal our new daughter reassured us. She said she felt safe and was working with a specialist in transgender healthcare. She provided us with valuable information to read. We connected with other parents of transgender kids online.

We felt like bad parents because this took so long to figure out. She reiterated that none of us had the knowledge or language for gender identity and gender dysphoria in the past. She and her spouse had been privately discussing transition for seven years. She assured us the time was right at this point in her life.

Some parents do not take this news well. Some even cast their children out into the streets.

I always go back to that day our child was born, cradling the miracle of a perfect human being with a cherub face, those fingers, toes, and tiny fingernails! Our love has grown as big as the Milky Way. It will not change. That is unconditional love; loving no matter what.

When I asked, how did you know you were a woman?

You turned the question back to me, Mom, how did you know you were a woman?

I just knew.

Well, see? That’s me also.

When a person feels at one with themself, anything is possible. Our daughter has flourished with her own computer business and has become a scientific artist of Astrophotography. She works with astronomers in Chile and Australia using remote computer telescopes to journey deep into the stars, still a child of the universe.

This is our love story, a story of deep listening, learning, advocacy, and affirmation. Whatever happens we will always love her, no matter what.

Oh, by the way, the love keeps going; our daughter and her spouse have been married for more than twenty years.

      By Annette Langlois Grunseth

Porch Cigarette

This went in unexpected ways. Let me know what you think.

I heave up each ritual drawbridge: cigarette
and coffee, cigarette and phone, cigarette and
window-staring. I get distracted by the constant

negotiation to stay present in the meeting,
the ride-along, the homework. I fortify myself
through my nostrils, my true and false ribs,

a mug compress held to my forehead with two
soft hands. Despite the gimmicks to quit, a marauder
grabs me by the scruff of the neck. I am levitated

by dangling arms and legs. The dangerous withdrawal
of tobacco, ascetic acid, ammonia, arsenic, cadmium
formaldehyde, lead, methanol, nicotine and tar.

A bridge permits or hinders passage. I am
the absence of smoke, a body mass of cranky
determinism. It's true I can taste the Mediterranean

in the pasta sauce, a remote and crumbling castle.
The bar stools rumble at the breakfast counter.
We never eat at the table, even when all five of us

are in the tower. A drawbridge lets down chink
by chink. The plunder is real. I stand on the other
side of myself. The long tunnel of bedtime—I whisper,

I laugh. It's always the same story with children.
The heat of their small to medium bodies pressed close,
rooting to belong. Husbands, too, swallowed up

by the lateness in an underground of unspoken.
The thrall of a household after the silence. I pad
the hallways in sock-footed imminence. Trees

rustle through the windows. I open and shut
doors. Ovate leaves rattle at the base
of my throat like craving. Anticipation is a box of

Marlboro Reds. I break in half three-quarters
of the cigarettes. A lighter is a talisman in the
pocket of my bathrobe. The front door unlatches

the ambience of night. I feel my way to the stoop,
waiting for my eyes to adjust. The porch is a wind
tunnel. The chimes gong three clear notes. The roof

casts a rectangular shadow in the grass. I sit on the
cold cement next to the hydrangea. I protect the scratch
of a small flame and inhale the burning tobacco. A rush

dowses my body with a chill. Mist rolls from my brain
to my shoulders to my coccyx. Stars prick my night
vision, pulsing unknowable points. Burden of bridge

triggers counterweight. A barbarian calm washes over
me, rank as moat water. I am out-urged by the
machinery of desire, the last portcullis of addiction.

Dancing with Dad

Tori, Here’s a poem I wrote for Moss Piglet’s next theme of “Dance.” Also, another poem I can include in my book.

Dancing with Dad

He touches the delicate needle

to the edge of the spinning 78.

Music of Vienna fills the room

Dad pulls me close,

I stand on top of his feet,

his size fourteens are my lead.

He waltzes five-year-old me

in circles, one, two, three,

one two three.

My small palm held by his hand,

Dad’s arm around my waist.

Learning to dance, I reel  

in his aura of Old Spice and whiskers

as we glide around the room   

two feet on top of two feet.

Here’s a version with tension: I’m not sure I like it. Feels “off” to me. What do you think?

Dancing with Dad

Mom and Dad danced

at the charity ball every December

and occasionally in the living room for fun.

His arm held her around the waist,

their hands pressed together,

raised to the rhythm,

eyes intent on each other

two-stepping across the room.

Tonight, Dad touches the needle

to the edge of the spinning 78.

Music of Vienna fills the room

Dad pulls me close,

to stand on top of his feet,

his size fourteens are my lead.

He waltzes five-year-old me

in circles – one, two, three,

one two three –

my small palms in his hands.

I feel a lift, a soaring,

like a baby bird learning to fly.

I remember his aura

of Old Spice and whiskers

as we glide around the room,   

two feet on top of two feet,

Mother in the kitchen,

the pressure cooker hissing.

3rd version (sent to MP 05/22/24)

Dancing with Dad

He touches the needle

to the edge of the spinning 78.

Music of Vienna fills the room

Dad pulls me close,

I stand on top of his feet,

his size fourteens are my lead.

He waltzes five-year-old me

in circles – one, two, three,

one two three –

I feel a lift, a soaring,

like a baby bird’s first flight

in his aura of Old Spice and whiskers.

We float around the room,  

two feet on top of two feet.

Going to the Polls with Mother

Here’s a poem I rewrote into a haibun for my “Summer Days at the Five and Dime” collection. Do the haiku work? I’d like to submit this to Silver Birch Press (deadline 4/15) “all about mothers” theme.

Going to the Polls with Mother

The gray-tiled floor smells of sweeping compound. There is a wooden stage to the left, basketball hoops on either end of the room. Mother is handed a paper ballot after giving her name and address to the poll worker. We walk across the gym to a wood-framed booth with a navy-blue curtain. She pulls the drape aside, stands at the shelf, picks up the yellow pencil tied to a long string; closes the curtain behind her. Voting is by secret ballot, she says. I am not allowed to look (even though I’m too young to read).

ducklings
follow the mallard
nibble at the riverbank

When absentee ballots are brought to the dining room at Woodside Manor, Mother, age ninety-one, is the first one in line. Her table mates grumble, We’re too old. We don’t care anymore. Mother bristles, explains why they need to know their candidates and vote. She marks her ballot, then returns to her room.

lion paces
back and forth
along the iron fence

Sun Sails

Annette, this is an ekphrastic poem for Art as Poetry. The painting is below. Let me know what you think.

In the cafe in the small town where the waters meet, we sit outside in a courtyard. Large triangles of canvas crisscross above our heads on heavy-duty wire. The rooted smell of coffee perks familiar. How many coffees have we drunk together? He holds a chair for me. Bistro tables hold promise yet are impractical to sit at. The chairs are painted celadon, a dewy glaze of green. "What are those called?" I ask the waitress, looking up. I am blinded by the sun-dazzled weave. "Sun sails." She smiles a full-furled smile. I am enamored by her nose ring, the smudge of paint on the back of her calf. "Sun sails," I repeat under my breath, pleased at the way the words leave my mouth. "What did you say?" he asks, holding his hand to the plaid pocket of his shirt as if retaking a pledge. "Sun sails," I say again, respite between us like placid water. The coffee arrives in ceramic mugs. My chair stutters on the paving squares as I stretch my legs, grasping the mug in two hands. My muscles tighten with the miles we've hiked. The sun sails cast angular shadow across his lower jaw, on the planter in the middle of the courtyard. I recognize impatiens bobbing in the clay bowl, bright pink. Cerise, I think, the same color as the calf smudge, the sun sails. We row about the other plant. A kind of lily, we think—dark green, palm-shaped leaves. When I say row, I mean squabble like the long-married. The courtyard creates a channel for the breeze that picks up, which stirs and swirls around us. We listen to the wires moan as they pull and slack, pull and slack. He assesses the configuration of sail and wire. "I could make that for you, if you wanted," he says. "Yes, I would like that," I say, crossing my ankle over his in the cherry-red shade.

Remember That Day
Lynn Peters

Weight of the World

This is the poem I wrote the other day. I wasn’t sure if it wasn’t too—too I don’t know. Picking on him? What do you think? Appropriate for the collection? Not?

The Earth is held aloft by four elephants on the back
of a sea turtle.

I resemble a sea turtle with the same striations
in my neck.

The elephants are named for the four directions.

Each day I carry the distress of repeat-dialing
or provoked silence.

The sea turtle is a reincarnation of an improbable god.

I check Find my Friends over coffee, at lunchtime,
at the end of the day, before bed.

Elephants can haul their massive body weight, and 
their knees won't buckle.

He forgets to go to work.

The sea turtle never sheds its shell.

He gets fired.

Elephants bathe themselves in dust.

He thinks his employer didn't properly
explain the nature of work.

Sea turtles can sense their place in the world by the
direction of the sun and Earth's magnetic field.

He loses his glasses, his keys, his wallet.

An elephants tusks are really teeth.

His neighbors complain about door bells
ringing in the middle of the night.

Sea turtles make great migrations to nest.

He needs money, a jumpstart, food more substantial
than microwave popcorn.

Certain species of elephant and sea turtle are endangered
and under conservation watch.

I consider joining a support group.