Poem-a-day

Not posted to fb yet, but there will be two today. One written a couple days ago, the other written today.

#15 Threshold-my-home, or, the trauma from years of displacement begins to ease.

Cloverhome
Scents of bees and safety and mom when I was little
Summer beckoner of lazy shade
And misty mornings with glimpses of glades between trees
Greeter-with-roses, pink and five-petalled and fragrant
Giver-of-bounty, grass and geese and aspens and apples
Wintersafe
Cedar cave of warmest wood
Ship’s hull that cups me against the wind
Place with warm fire’s beating heart
And the snore of sleeping dogs
Your walls are my living skin
Your fields are my tendrils of thought
That lead me
Back to the door
Way
Of
My
Self


#16 First smoke of wildfire season

When I write I think about displacement
Every day.
When the fires come I think about it
Every minute.

It’s a hot spring and my body is tense already
With the memory of wildfire smoke
And fleeing with trailers of animals
And that’s when I had somewhere to go.

Tension that came from years ago
Fleeing poverty from roomshare to apartment
Trading freedom for a roof over the head
And a couple months in the same bedroom.

Someone always helps me in the end
But it’s hard to trust the world without a system.
What happens when I’m not pretty enough
Or smart enough for this charity to fulfill my rich friends?

Whatever soft space once existed
Whatever joy peeks out and runs wild
In clear summer air is scarred
With drifting smoke awakening every old terror.

Land of my land of my land of my land of my
Heart of my heart of my heart of my heart of my
Body of my body of my body of my body of my
Memory of my memory of my memory of home.

You for whom the earth is not your body
You for whom the walls are not your skin
You for whom the seasons are not your heartbeat
Save me now
I’m curled under the bed
Hiding
I’d be crying if it was safe to move.
Bury me here
So my body can finally stay home.