FOCUS!

Sooooo much to do! Sooooo litte time!
But you’ll get through,
That hill you’ll climb!
Just look ahead,
Don’t look behind!
Don’t be misled,
Focus your mind!
Then pretty soon,
You’ll surely find,
You’ve done so much,
In so little time!

(for my niece Jennifer, who is a young teacher, finishing off her school year, and getting married in 26 days. She’s a bit frayed at the moment. 😉    )

Apple

I lay there, ripe.
Swollen in the wet grass.
Waiting.
My brightness catches your eye.
You pick me up,
Inspect me for flaws.
Rub me on your sleeve.
And then,
When I’m ready,
You bite hard,
Into my delicate skin,
Concealing the soft,
Yielding flesh inside me.
My sweet juices,
Fill your mouth.
Drip down your chin,
You lap at them,
With your tongue.
Soon, I am devoured to my core.
You fling the rest of me,
Into the woods.
Your task is complete.
And mine.
For I am here,
To sacrifice my flesh.
And return my seeds,
To the earth.

The Fatherly Chain of Forgiveness

The circle turns, the world moves on,
Generations have come and gone,
In some ways it seems we’ve evolved,
In other ways we’ve just revolved,
We’ve handed down from dad to son,
A bag of tricks already spun,
Who knows how far back the chain goes?
With no sign it’s in its death throes,
My granddad not a dad you’d  call,
Still dad forgave, mistakes and all,
Then Dad left us with naught to live on,
I learned to forgive and to move on,
It seems now I live my destiny,
Waiting for my sons to forgive me.

Lobotomy

One usually associates them with,
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.
McMurphy’s eggs are scrambled,
And he becomes a vegetable omelette.
His body and his brain are then,
Reunited in death.

Real life is far less romantic.
My grandmother once told me the story,
Of her own mother’s lobotomy.
There were no triumphant escapes,
No mercy killings.
Only tragedy.

Her mother had a brain tumor.
In the 1950s, the usual treatment,
For a brain tumor was surgery.
To cut away the tumor,
Along with part of the brain:
A lobotomy.

Unlike McMurphy, she did not,
End up in a vegetative state.
She was not brain dead.
Instead, she was not she.
My grandmother’s mother,
Had become a different person.

She still recognized everyone.
Still knew who she was.
But her personality was altered.
Her affection now indifference.
My grandmother lost her mother,
Before her mother died.