hermit crab life

I wonder how my mom lived
pouring her soul into the same,
small vessel day after day;
Fitting into the confines of choices
made years ago, when
consequences were just
ephemeral dreams.

And how can I, now in my own,
slightly larger and spacious surely
more refined, life continue to live
in structures I chose years ago?

Or more wildly curious, venture
to wonder how I might pour myself
out to flow through caverns,
rain onto gardens, linger as a cool
opaque forest mist, quench thirst, or
sit on grass like morning dew
....just exist.

in 20 years nothing changes

twenty years ago I was thirteen
vomiting my feelings and heart
out into an electronic void,
praying for an echo of voices
to welcome
me home
to the darkness
to the dim
night highs
where i am seen
and heard.

family ties

i sink into quilted generational patterns,
hemmed and sewn black holes,
patched together piecemeal inheritance.
you shells of humans, empty casings, breeding
without home, without foundation, without
reason, blindly follow the path laid out
-you made me.

i am driving through winterscapes
imagining my escape, vast white stretches
of scattered farms with possible hearths and
inside families, cozy and safe, and yet
distant, i am the dank boglike soil
rich under-foot, under snow.

trees nourished by its decay,
it's peat, it's me, wet and dark beneath,
keep me buried and i will feed the trees
you will rest under branches drenched in
my sweat and hot tears and rot.

shovel me up and the steam freezes
midair, i am alone, i am curled in the pattern
i spiraling the same filigree, DNA
structures and ladders.
and climbing is hard.
i just spin and spin and reweave the same section
same as my family, you, did before.

ok.

Today was just crisp air and crunchy leaves
as I walked through the woods at my work.
I was playing pretend again, all dressed up,
like I was a responsible and mature employee
but, inside I'm just a child, barely getting by.

Pandemic

Did you ever stagger to the bathroom,
so half asleep, that you don't know if it's a dream?
This is that. It's a slow fog creepin' in, as you drive,
so spaced out that when you park
you don't know how you arrived.
How did I get here?

(dissociate)

This is that. You don't know if you're alive.
But commute, cough, telecommute, mask, hide
at least we might survive---this.
It's never-ending. It's that perpetual pause.
It's that eventual breath-in and sigh-out.
Ok, now withdrawing, it's tired gnawing.
Have you ever felt that? This is that.

Poem I wrote this morning:

Poetic justice, natural consequence;
Call it what you will.
Maybe hubris or Icarus
Flying towards the sun.
Some say he got his just desserts,
Which makes me think of Klingons
(Revenge is a dish best served cold)
I suppose he did 'just get served.'
And Golly, it does seem so cold
How we have turned away to gloat.
Oh, call it what you will!
I don't care; All I know is,
The President tested positive for COVID today;
And I don't know what to say.

Five

 "Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs."

Every month the moon performs a strip tease,
unveiling herself, vulnerable and shaking
embarrassed, she slips the night sky over
her shoulder to hide.
as do I.

The Iris' violent violet petals, unfurl
ribboned arms, curling up to heavens and
down to hell, bending apart from
her yellow powder heart.
as do I.

In summers, there's an insect who sheds
a crunchy shell clawed onto willow bark, is it
growing like a snake does or completely changed
like a butterfly? or does it both?
as do I.

My layers peel back, like cuticle skin
picked till bleeding, revealing below,
I break character, forgot my line, and
one turns away from the fragility.
as do I.

In crowded spaces, there is always
a child crying among the collective roar,
pitch sharp and cutting, one wonders
how the others so easily ignore.
as do I.