No Exit (Poem A Day Project)

On this late afternoon, a yearning overtakes me
when only my eyes and nose stay dry as islands
in a plenitude of liquid and heat,

all the rest submerged,

thighs bobbing, hair spiraling 

like seaweed.

The radio makes noises my flooded ears

have lost sense of, 
steamed skin, cooked bones.

I feel a self disperse, float high
into insubstantiality, into delight

into the last drops of density 

light the window with haloes,

push gently against the glass

ready to make a graceful farewell 

when there's a knock

on the bathroom door, 
a chill in the water

and the noises from the radio 

make perfect sense again.

To the Siblings I Never Met

In case you ever wonder 

about the man who flicked you off

like a cigarette, about what you missed, 

I want to tell you he lived by strict rules: 

No touching, no conversation. A language

of snarls, mutterings, angry stares.

We constantly offended him. 

Oh, an occasional wisecrack or two, 

so amusing that raucous whooping sprung 

loose from my knots-- 

laughter so unrestrained he thought I was screaming--

and there was his strawberry shortcake in summer--

a delicious cloud of whipped cream on slopes

of pound cake mushy with fruit.

And there was that wink--a sudden impish entrapment
to call a truce, to pardon him with Freudian notions--

he too grew up forsaken--or simpler ones,
like, men are made for war.

But under his crushing disregard, 
our brothers malfunctioned mightily.

He was their chief impeder and they his 

and though we're old now and he long dead, 

his finger points with taut disdain at 

each of us who are still squeamish, 

still tensed--still hoping, insanely, he’ll change.

That’s what we are heir to. 
It’s all that accrued to the children 

he did not leave behind.

Wedding Photograph

I'm sure the glamorous portrait was her idea.

The lady relished costume, the spotlight--

my mother was a monarch at heart.

She’s wearing the fur coat that saved her life:

that coat with layers of chic dresses beneath 

took up two seats and got her thrown off 

the evacuation train spitfirers blew up 

soon after it left her at the Paris station.

She melts Lana Turner-like into the camera, 

beautifully, irrationally serene, 

floating in myths, as she was prone to do, 

the myth that she will make sense of this man

so inclined to withdrawal, 
that she will uncork him, dramatize him.

And look how much she achieved their first day! 

Look at his lordly bearing! Handsome and uniformed. 

What aplomb in a man whose eyes and lips often clenched 

but here my father looks coolly past her 

across the room with only the faintest gleam of recalcitrance

in his blue eyes. 

Does he sense already the distance between them? 

The daily parade of grievances he will endure

about his bluffing, lying, drinking, 

all the other disquieting acts of  this injured soul?

And I’m in the picture too, hidden under the coat, impelled

to share their  unease, their wandering lives, 

which will prove interesting at times but never
as grand as she’s imagining here.

He died 14 years and two days before her  

and when she wailed with grief, her torrential tears

were not for him but for what might have been.

Just Another Thursday

I remember, if only barely, 
what feelings soaked the eyes

of the child I used to be when 
on that first Thanksgiving in America

I skittered to the kitchen and saw mother
stuffing cabbages with sticky clumps
 of ham and bread like Germans do.

In my mind's dimlit pantry, 
where memories cure

there stands a puzzled 5 year old 
blinking dully
at those leafy skulls.

So odd it seemed 
after weeks and weeks

of painting plump and fleecy 
fowl in school

that there in my Ohio home
Thanksgiving was just another Thursday.
Father fighting in Korea and mother
just shut the oven door 

on those lime-green cabbage heads

she fixed once a week.

Now be glad, she scolded--

nonplussed, noncomprehending--

today's the day one stuffs a thing

and that I did.

Idealist

It’s a joyful convocation, the one I dream of—

a glimmering jubilee where jolly friends and family 

clasp hands around an altar all aglow with light and silver.

All are clapping, praising, toasting

laughing and embracing, spinning 

delicious tales that kindle cheering up and down the rows.

Steaming dishes spiced and tinted as prescribed by generations

hurry down the table rousing awe and clamor as the children 

suck on fruity brews and their elders swig the beer and wine—

spiking fancies all the more.

Not a soul declines to linger after every belly has been stuffed

to remember one more wise or zesty story, swallow one more spoon

of Harvest Torte—so delighted and so thankful seems each and every one

for this communion.

And when ochre shadows finally flush the hearth,

when burning timber snaps and glistening candles drip,

my old yearnings all have faded. I am happy here just being 

knowing time is melting, melting with the whipped cream on the torte.

Pride

How old am I now?

My mother asks, her eyes do not open 

but she is awake under the lids.

Almost 79, I say. 

Soon you’ll be 79.

That’s enough. I’ve lived long enough.

Her voice bears the tone  

of one who’s just been told 

the fine coat on her arm

is not on sale, 

she must pay full price.

The tone of All right. I’ll take it.

She will not shame herself 

by asking for more or

making a scene 

when the policy 

seems so firm, 

so carved in stone.

My mother does all the talking

As I am growing up, my mother does all the talking.

She talks and talks and talks about the war. 

About the sirens and the bombs and mothers fleeing.

About children crawling out of hell and screaming. 

About the sick and old gone lost with hair on fire.

About the smell of skin and how it smolders.

About feeling crushed too tight to kneel to pray.

Nothing takes her mind off what she’s seen.

And so she must do all the talking 

and all I do is listen.