Disconnections: May 26.18

Some years back, my little granddaughter was poking through my wallet and came across a small photograph of a boy. “Who’s this,” she asked, “and what’s he doing in your wallet?” I explained that he was a student I’d taught back in the long-ago 60s, and that I had resolved to keep it to remind me of the good things about teaching.

The other night I sat in the audience as that same granddaughter performed on the cello in the 8th-grade orchestra concert. In their pink and green hair and trendy jean knee-holes, with arms and legs that seemed to sprout longer even as we watched, they somehow stilled their cosmic exuberance with all eyes on their teacher. They made music and therefore life. They were wonderful. And hilarious.

Yesterday I came to the computer to check the weather before I headed out for Friday errands. And there it was: another school shooting. Noblesville West Middle School. About 40 miles north of me. Again and yet again. All the shootings have hit home, but this was more sinister. I think of the 7th-grade boy in my wallet, who stands for all the students I have known. I think of the eighth-grade orchestra. And I think of the guns and the blood. I cannot unthink it.

 

Disconnections: May 18.18

Dear reader,

Something weird started yesterday: I couldn’t write a post with a photo in it. It goes without saying that I have no idea what’s going on, but I can’t help wondering if a very recent Windows update messed up something with WordPress. Like I know what I’m talking about.

I can write a post without photos, apparently, but I’ve grown to love the photo as prompt (thanks, Tamara!) and, besides, there’s a matter of principle involved when we want the computer to do something and it won’t. I want to know what’s up with this. I’m miffed. So there will be a slight sabbatical here while I work on a more colorful vocabulary and try to figure this out.

Maureen

Connections: May 15.18

Flocks of wisteria

in lavender plume

hover mid-air

on winged perfume.

 

More thanks to the S.W. Berg Photo Archives.

Connections

 

Connections: May 13.18

It’s that time again: time to get on my apostrophe soap box. It’s “Mother’s Day” all over the place, but I insist on “Mothers’ Day.” Not only is it a day to celebrate all mothers, but it’s also a day that’s been so homogenized and hysterialized that Mom is what Hallmark has made her. Mothers’ Day hysteria hits hard. Now — heaven help us — there are even pop-up ads to remind us we need to do more.

Back in the day, it was simpler: you snuck someplace and made a heart-rending card out of construction paper and erasures. And you went hanky-shopping with your dad. “Hanky” is short for “handkerchief,” a decorative, often beautiful, piece of cloth we used to blow our noses in. Or for our mothers to spit on and wipe some goo off our chins. Or (we were Catholic) to plop on your head if you were a hatless woman (gasp) entering a church. Hankies were nothing if not versatile.

One year my brother gave Mom the Hope Diamond of hankies, lacy, white, with a very elaborate embroidered “M” on it, much to her bewilderment (her name was Evelyn). What’s the M for? she asked naively. “M for Mom!” he replied, with some exasperation — why did she need to ask?

After Mom died, I threw out many things, but I couldn’t bring myself to throw out her hankies, which now live in a drawer upstairs. Including the one with the flowing regal “M.”

Whatever your memories for the day, dear reader, I hope there is a mom or a grandma in your heart, on the phone, or maybe across the table. Maybe even an old hanky in your pocket.

 

Connections

 

 

 

 

Connections: May 11.18

Some ancient mythic language

ebbing, swelling, weightless

like liquid air

many-voiced

chorus of Sophocles

bade me stop.

I turned toward the sound

the fullness of new leaves

spring petals

soft as babies

supple in newness

stroked by wind

sibilant and sure

wanting me to know

something.

Still as the dead

I listened

taut

to pluck a word

but there was none.

 

Connections

Connections: May 10.18

A gardener’s patience is saintly

trained in Nature’s way

and that’s how on recent occasion

you might have heard me say:

Hey, lazy seeds, what’s your problem?

Where are my beautiful flowers?

You’ve been tucked in and watered

for well over forty-eight hours!

Connections

 

Connections: May 9.18

When you’ve lived your life

to your coral best

wither surrounds you

a curled past

strewn in dimness

fills your lowered gaze

how do you not

despite proud stem

drop one tear?

 

Connections

Connections: May 8.18

I don’t know how to play it

wouldn’t know where to begin

and yet it beams out a gravity

much like a rolling pin

or terracotta flowerpot

pruners, or a hoe

piano or organ keyboard,

a scraper for bread dough,

a pad of lined blank paper

a pen, an artist brush

they make my fingers eager

they give me a head rush

with primal primitive instinct

my fingers stretch, reach out

but it’s really my very self

the pull is all about.

Certain things there are

that, silent, speak to me

make my fingers restless

to do, to make, to be.

 

More thanks to the S.W. Berg Photo Archives.

Connections

 

 

Connections: May 6.18

My trowel went limp

my heart flip-flopped

I couldn’t move

was stone-cold stopped.

My gardener’s breath

was stuck mid-throat

at dazzling shock

in shady cote.

If breath-taking beauty

can be perfected

it’s when it happens

unexpected.

 

 

Yes, dear reader, another amazement in Someone Else’s Garden! First the lemon-butter narcissus, and now these snowy petals with the blackberry stain. I’ve never even seen a tree peony before, and now I actually have one! (And I didn’t know how much I have food on my mind.)

Connections

 

 

Connections: May 5.18

Accusing, narrowed eye,

disapproving glare,

prunish dour expression,

unblinking fiendish stare.

Beneath those rosy feathers

curmudgeon’s heart must beat —

how does such a malcontent

warble song so sweet?

 

Connections