When You Were in Trouble with Grandpa

1.  Pulling up the stool in Grandma's kitchen with cousin Stephi after riding Cherokee bareback and double, so we can pull out the canister with the lemonade mix poured too generously into the metal cups that turn ice cold.  And Grandpa walks in and we're in trouble pretty big this time.  And next time we remember to ask if we "may have a glass of lemonade."

2.  He drives past our trailer in his gray truck and we're playing on the propane tank and you can near see the fire in his brake lights when he stops, and he comes out and we aren't ever going to pretend the propane tank is a horse again.  

3.  He's left the hose pouring water on the ground, and I pick it up to drink, and he knocks it out of my hand.  "Ditchwater."  

4.  And he wrestles with us on the floor, a softpack in his pocket, and he likes to joke about the mosquitos he heard while he was moving pipe, the ones who were looking for a few young girls to carry back, so they could just feed off of them all summer.  And we believe him for at least two weeks, avoiding the ditches and on the lookout for the ring leader, the big guy, that Grandpa described in detail.

5.  He kept his smokes in the crisper drawer of the fridge and would send one of us kids in to grab a pack for him.  And usually there would be a package of pop rocks in there, too, and those were for the kid who ran in first.

6.  He loved fireworks.  And so did I.

7.  And it was best when Grandma would hand one of the egg beaters covered in chocolate cake batter to Grandpa and the other to you and the two of you would lick them clean and then Grandpa would ask if you were full and you'd say, "Yes" and he'd say, "I think you could eat more."  But you really can't, so you stick out your stomach as far as it will go and say, "See, Grandpa, no room."  And he'd poke your tummy and agree.  His sweet-tooth was never full.

(inspired by poetry class today)

Living With an Animal Lover

1.  The guilt of a mother who accidentally smuggles in a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for her daughter to eat at the miniature preschool table because they are late again, and the class is in chapel and your daughter is barefoot and won't eat and won't put on shoes and the only thing you can think is "Man, I really need some coffee and possibly a comb."  And then you are caught with the peanut product in your hand in a No Peanut Zone and you are breaking all the rules this morning by accident.  And you whisper to Cinderella, the class gerbil, "Where's the nearest bed in this joint because I'm going back to it."

2.  And then you get to the Spur and all the biscuits and gravy are gone.  NOOOOOO, you cry.  Why?  Why?  Not today.  Not like this.  So you get some sort of breakfast burrito thing and you are grumpy.  Yeah, you're grumpy, but it's her birthday, the woman at the register and she asks if you want salsa and yes, of course you do, thank you.  And you tell her happy birthday.  And then you sit down and the couple you've made friends with is still there and she has brought a quilt for you to see, and you are starting to feel better because people are good and they are talking to you, and you like talking to them and then you're laughing and the earth is your home again and the coffee here is the best gas station coffee you've ever had.

3.  And you read poems and you stare out the window into the fields and you watch countless Chevy trucks passing.  And it's good, too.  And a call comes from a strong-mother-in-arms and she needs prayers for her daughter and we talk it over between the two of us and between God.

4.  After preschool, it takes you two hours to pick up the toys around the house, pack the bag for Wednesday in York, load the trash and recycling, take out the compost and for a brief moment, you consider the nearest bed, and you make it and walk out the door with some keys in your hand and the wind is whipping you into better shape.

5.  Maybe she'll wear calfgirl boots.  So you go to the Western Edge and she finds pink glitter (cute as can be) boots and she runs around the store with Red, the world's best cowdog, chasing her with an old sock from the community sock basket in his mouth, a tail nub wiggling.  And anytime we go there, he follows her because animals know her.

6.  So you go see the chicks at Orschelyn's and you need a 50 pound bag of birdseed and some flower seeds and a new pair of work gloves.  And you see your girl holding a chick for over 15 minutes telling everyone who passes by to please be quiet because that chick is so good in her hand sleeping and pooping there.  And she asks me to please get out my phone and call Lynn as soon as we can so we can have some chickens.  She cries when you have to go.

7.  And then she warns you as you flip the birdseed bag around so the lady at the register can scan it:  You don't get birds when you buy birdseed, Mom.  You just get birdseed.  What I want is a bird.

This girl knows too much about what a seed can and can't do.

I Want You to Meet My Mom

Here she is:

She knows everything about me.  And I mean everything.  (I promise, Mom.  There's nothing else I need to tell you about.  You know it all, and I'm looking forward to not being grounded sometime in 2027.)

She loves me, all of me.  What a relief.

I love her, too.

The Grass is Greener on the Other Side of March

Feeling lifted outside of my life.  This is normal during the changing of the guard--that fragile moment when no one seems to be watching the door and whoever I am slips out so she can try on the summer skin: the gloves that hold the dirt-crusted shape of two hands praying around their quiet work.

In the poem-moment, she resembles nothing I've ever seen.  From the dark wood of the desk, she is daring me to let go of anything I thought was mine, dropping it onto a page she'll burn in her heart because I'm still not that brave, and she's got a pile of ashes and scars and kisses and stars.  Hey girl, take a load off.

And daughters know that all dishes must be done while dancing.  And she adopts a single seed and feeds it all day long, mixing old coffee grounds and potting soil for it.  "I love plants, Mommy, because you love plants and I love you.  And I am a really good mommy for this plant."  And mothers know that children aren't empty, waiting to be filled.  They glow.  Just watch and notice it when it shines.  That's how most people work, not just kids.

Ila's Recipe

(A new poem that is still kind of fragile and unformed...)

The sweet and bitter mix that draws
the moths down from the blossom,
a killing secret whispered into the pink idea
of an apple born with worm in fall.

I may be too late.

I am talking to her:  The woman who hung
the windsweapt jug and twine
under the same trees for 60 years,
the twine now part of the branch.
She explains the equal parts
sugar and vinegar, a single banana peel.
And I can't listen, picturing how to hang
the rope and jar beneath the life
of my heart, drawing the moth from the blossom
because one year there might be fruit
cut open and clean
if I am brave enough
to acknowledge the bitter,
the sweet.  That some are moth
and some are bee.

A Work I Can Do in the Comfort of Voicelessness

Dirt:
Digging out old roots in the garden this evening, hop on the shovel, mellow ground, and the breeze dances along and I'm swaying with a shovel and the shovel has pretty good rhythm.

Nora's world:
Where she goes and how I call her back from it with my time-chained mother schedule as she mixes water and sand and I crawl into the leafy nest under the blackberry bush looking for the green shoots that prove garlic, suddenly seeing sun inches above the horizon:  "Shouldn't we be eating supper by now, Nora?  Do you know what time it is?  I lost track of time.  Are you even hungry?  I don't think I'm even hungry.  I'm usually always hungry.  Are you hungry?"  Beauty is a fullness.  Tree sounds and bird silhouettes fill the empty space with something raw and good.

Staring into Space:
What do you see when you are looking but not seeing?  What is this thing in your heart when you are looking beyond looking?  And the Nebraska expanse calls you beyond your own sight into the sight of God's imagined spaces, the long, receding line of a life pulled farther into life as it leaves it, a too tight jacket or a pocket watch inside your great, great grandmother's apron pocket as you slip your hand in and pull out the sound of her caterwaul and keening behind the white shed, reading the letter of always goodbye.

A Song Worth Singing:
A song across a million miles and minutes that calls the boys and girls in from their near-death pranks and gives them something fragile to hold, something even more dangerous should it fail because now they are older and they hold each other.

A Song of Yes, Please:
And I could write like this forever if I could live like this forever inside the space of a garden made of all that He said was good.

Grateful For:

1.  Strange bits of fiction writing that seem to be leading me toward something coherent.  Or incoherent.  I don't know.  Without hope, without despair:  write.  (Last night was a little bit of it.  I have no idea what it's about.  That's exciting and strange.)

2.  Grandma's plaque, the one that says, "Slow me down, Lord."

3.  The wheelbarrow I dropped on my foot today while cleaning up all the dead stuff around the place.  I cut back the bushes and roses, pulled dead leaves, raked and picked up fallen branches.  The usual stuff.

I usually pile it all onto a tarp and drag it to the garden, load after load.  And the dead leaf/branch/self pile keeps getting bigger and bigger.  It covers half the garden now.  Lynn and Kirk will come with their pitchforks and gator and haul it off to the burn pile for me.  So, I picked up the wheelbarrow to shake the last clinging branches out and brought it down right on top of my foot, which was obscured by the leaves.  Anyway.  I'm not very graceful.   But I'm thankful for the reminder to pay closer attention, not hurry.  I am also amazed at my sheer strength, like the Hulk or something.  (Ha!)

4.  Working outside until the sun set at 8:00.  Thanking Him for the day and the work and the breeze and the birdsong as He speaks of a time to rest, the sky closing like a book from the east's darkening distance.

5.  And a poem for the day:

 Parallel with the earth, spine
straightened against grass, eye
lids a red curtain, trees breathing,
sun warming something icy
inside.  Warm tear
of thanks and thaw.

6.  Groceries.

7.  The daily habit of His word.

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