Birds

I was only eight

Years old

When I watched the birds fall from the sky.

I still concerned myself with

Dolls & passing notes.

But now I was scared to let

My daddy

Go to work.

No eight year old

Knows what

Patriotism

Means. But we did.

The attack of 1941

Never felt like

Ours.

Neither did the gunshots

That took down leaders.

But this day will always

Feel like

Ours.

I still remember waking up to a TV screen

And a silent house.

To a mother & father

With fear in their eyes

But normalcy in their actions.

Years later I read about

Pink mist

Filling the air

And it didn’t feel

Far removed. I understood

What he was talking about.  

The leaping. I

Remembered.

I still remember being eight years old

And watching

The birds fall from the sky. 

(Link to old blog post about 9/11 here)

Saturday Morning Showers

I

Saturday morning showers

Are my favorite.

With not a care in

The world

At only nine years old

I already used

Showers to

Contemplate.

II

Plinking and dropping

All over my

Hair and my

Face and my

Eyes and my

Teeth.

Water, water, everywhere.

I’m much too happy

To ever care

If the hot water runs into my face

Or if the water turns cold

For even one split second.

Because I secretly like

The cool, clear streams for just that one moment

Pouring down and down and down

Enough to make me shiver

But not enough for me

To cry.

But only in a Saturday morning

Shower.

III

I always complain

About showering at night.

Mornings are better.

IV

The air is

Always too cold

After a long

Saturday shower.

There are goosebumps everywhere

When I step out.

I quickly run,

Light-footed

With towels galore

Wrapped tightly so

As not to sneak a peek.

And land myself in a still and shivering pile right on the carpet in the living room in the sunspot of sunlight as it slips through the pulled back curtains and the dingy glass window so that I can warm myself like a cat because even cats need baths every once in a while when they get themselves all slippery and slick with the mud of a brand-new day.

V

I have to move

From my sunspot

So that mama

Can vacuum.

She puts on some old

Synthesized music

And begins to dance,

Swaying her hips back and forth

To the time.

Her hips no longer slim

Like a youth

But widened.

A badge of honor

For birthing four

Screaming and

Laughing

Babies

Into a world

Of Saturday morning showers

And lilac trees

And dead-end streets

With blackberries to pick and

Thorns to scratch.

She always cleans on Saturdays.

Pink Shirt

The shirt was obviously red. Dull, yes; but clearly red. No one who had enough time to inspect the shirt and its’ color could possibly mistake it for pink. Under normal circumstances, a red shirt would be perfectly acceptable—welcome, in fact. Pink may have been her favorite color, but red was a second choice that she could live with.

However, a red shirt would not match the pink and black and white skirt that her mother had already purchased for her earlier in the week. No, a red shirt would not do. It would not do at all.

She was confused at the notion—how on earth could her mother have picked up this shirt that was clearly and significantly the wrong color? Yet here she was handing her a folded cotton shirt, smile wide as can be, looking at her with the expectation of excitement.

And it was that smile, full of an innocent and foolish hope that drove her to lie. She felt in a deep and unknown chasm of being that she could not simply tell her mother that the shirt was the wrong color. The shirt was not a shirt. A child should not know more than her parents, because parents know everything.

And so—the shirt would no longer be red. It would be pink

The red shirt paired with the pink and black and white skirt was a clash of unimpressive proportions. And she wore it ashamedly, pretending it was she who made the mistake, simply pulling it from the drawer without paying attention.

No one needed to know that the red shirt was meant to be pink.

Red Rocks and Shooting Stars

I was readily determined to never love the desert. This was an easy enough task—who could love the brown, scrubby foliage and the pathetically small mountains after the grand, sweeping beauty of my home? Green and fresh and old—the desert stood no chance. Two full years of disdain for the place I begrudgingly called home—no regrets.

I had no idea that falling in love with you also meant falling in love with the desert.

The car pulled up at our destination, and I unfolded myself from the small, green, overheating mess. The ride had been long enough to make me feel old and tired. I stretched my back and gazed around while you reached over and pulled me against you. Suddenly a new sense of appreciation filled my consciousness. The red rock was stunning, ancient and sublime. The air was full of dust and history—the gigantic blue lake was nestled stoically in the background. I wanted to lose myself in that atmosphere.

We spent our days exploring the water, discovering ravines and Indian ruins, getting close to fish and pushing the limits of our lungs. We spent the nights exploring each other, discovering new emotions and stories, getting further from reality, and testing the limits of our lungs.

The stars were falling around us, every thirty seconds we got to wish on a shooting star. I thought falling stars were a good thing—but perhaps they were a warning. Even the heavens knew what we didn’t.

I fell deeply in love with the desert, and with you.

You are inseparable in my mind.

I cannot look at the vast stretches of orangey red dust and feel anything but sad. The desert rears up in my mind when I least expect it to, and with it I am a woman down. Brought to my knees with the sharp realization that you don’t want me.

Clams

The air was warm but the sun was gone—the lake was usually sunny and bright, but not today. I wandered along the rocky shores, watching the tall figure ahead of me. He called back that he would be walking around the curve of the island, and I nodded my consent. I stayed where I was. Clam shells dotted the ground, standing out against the smooth pebbles. The nearer I got to the water the more shells I saw, until they began to be not just empty fragments and broken half shells, but full clams. Most were partially submerged in the sand, with the water lapping over them. The clams were everywhere—mottled brown, slightly oblong circles in great quantities, almost as numerous as the rocks. I felt them—sharp edges and smooth centers underneath my wrinkly feet. Walking in the cool water all day had numbed me slightly to the sensation.

I crouched low to the ground, plucking one single clam from its’ watery home. I held it above me and watched it close tightly, sealing out any chance of me prying it open. My young body held itself taut above the grit underneath, excepting the slight bulge of my thighs as they squeezed out of my swim suit bottoms. I held myself carefully in that crouched position, not daring to feel the cool water lap at my rear.

I held the clam in one hand and held myself steady with the other. I looked around the water near me and selected a large rock. Then I crawled out of the water to find another rock that would stay anchored in the ground. When I found it, I placed my clam on top, and slightly brought the rock in my hand down upon it.

Nothing.

The second time I smacked much harder, and instantly felt the clams’ delicate outer home crack and crumble between the two rocks. Disgust filled me as I looked down upon the light pink flesh that I had so desired to see, being pierced and bothered by the sharp fragments that had once been its’ safe place.  One organism, sentenced to death by curiosity. Could I claim curiosity though? Or was it another emotion entirely? I could almost see a tiny pulse in the pink meat that was spread across the rough sandstone. Delicate and exposed and hurt—the clam had not meant to vulnerable. I had taken it there.

The barely swirling waters around me threatened to pull my now-dead clam back into the watery grave where they all came from. The sound of approaching footsteps pulled me out of my horrified revelry. My hasty attempts to cover the clam were not in vain.

There was no trace of my shame on the beach that day. The clam lay buried beneath sand that would soon wash away, leaving simply the leftover shell of an unsuspecting clam.