Tag Archives: writing

Sofia Elena, Driver, Nissan Altima

My mother told me it is cold here.
I thought Ohio is near West Virginia
and West Virginia is near Virginia,
and this is in the south of the country.
But now there is snow. I have called
the woman at the real estate office,
the woman who showed me the
apartment in the fall. I have said
that I don’t know how to drive
in the snow, and also that I
do not have the clothes
for cold weather.

She has told me nothing,
this woman. I think that she
and I will not be friends. Her
voice says to me, Why did not
my husband get this job? Why
are you coming here? Her voice
laughs at me because of
these questions.

I think that this is not my fault,
that the company believes
an engineering degree is
necessary in order to
schedule the workers.
I have this degree.

If I am not coming here, I am
working at the dam in Brasil. 
My mother prefers that. It is
closer. She thinks that I will
fall in love, stay here, even
when eight months is over.

I do not see anything to love.
I know there is shale under the
snow, and gas inside the shale,
and money to keep me here
for eight months.

That is all.

 

 

For Open Link Night at dVerse Poets.

 

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Shawna, Driver, Toyota Corolla

I’ve been thinking a lot about how everything is connected.
One time in geometry class, we had a sub who talked to us
about Fibonacci numbers, fractals. A lot of people were like,
whatever, but I took notes, looked it all up later, at home.
Sometimes I talk about it with Ben, on the way to and from
school. That’s one reason I rescued him from the bus—
because I knew he was someone I could talk to like that.
I know things about Ben that he doesn’t even know yet,
because he’s younger than me, but also because that’s
how I am. It’s not always so great, because I can’t
turn it off, and there are times when I would like to.
It would be nice to just go to the football game
like everyone else, you know? Not think so much.
Just be a kid, I guess. I don’t know what I am now;
I just turned 18, and a couple girls in my class have
babies already, and I swear, one of them has like
a 5-year-old. But do I feel like I could move out today,
get a job, be a real person yet? Probably not. It’s hard
to imagine being somewhere else next year, either
a couple of hours away or more like seven. We’ll see
how it all works out. My mom is still pushing hard for
Belmont Tech or OU-Zanesville, living at home, how
So-and-So found that they saved a ton of money,
it still felt like being at college, and then they didn’t
have all those loans. She and I both know that’s
not going to be me. I do think about Ben, what will
happen when I’m not here to give him rides, keep him
from getting picked on. But at least there’s Skype, or
we both got iPads for Christmas—still not sure how we
managed that—so now we have FaceTime, too. I think,
even though it’s not like we’ll ever get married or anything
(we don’t like each other like that), that Ben and I will
always be in touch somehow. It’s like how I’ve read that
in the ground, under all the rock and stuff, there are
secret rivers, and that’s where our water comes from.
We’re like that. Two secret rivers, side by side.

 

 

For Open Link Night at dVerse Poets. (Please sample some of the other fine poems, too.)

 

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Nancy, Driver, Toyota Avalon

I used to carry a paper bag
with me, to breathe into.
It’s true. I kept it right here
beside me, and I used it
at red lights, to keep
the panic down. I had

a whole system of
back roads and no
left turns, or at least
none without arrows.

I was hypnotized a few times,
laid out in a recliner, told that
my car was a sanctuary, a place
of great peace. I drifted along

on that idea, and then
went back to back roads
and paper bags. One day,

I got on this interstate, I-70,
by accident, merged onto it
while I was thinking about
something else. And that’s

what did it, I guess. No bag
since then, and I can pretty much
drive anywhere, make left turns
whenever I want. Sometimes

I imagine we’re all white blood cells,
platelets, I don’t know—something
in the blood—moved by a great

muscle, a heart I can’t see
but can feel. Shift into drive,
foot on the gas, breathe once,
drop into the bloodstream.

Go.

 

For Open Link Night at dVerse Poets.

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Joan, Front Seat Passenger, Honda Civic

I don’t know why we have to go to Gratiot
to visit his mother. She doesn’t even know us
anymore—and when she did, she never liked
me, or even the children. It’s all about him.
Always. The number one son, quarterback,
love of her life, because Donny never
amounted to anything, left her—

after he died—in a broken house
clinging to a broken mountainside.
Everything here will collapse
sooner or later. That’s what will come
of all this fracking, though everyone
is so happy, now, to get that check.
Mineral rights. Trucks outside
the Super 8, new motels
going up every day.

New money. New everything,
where everything used to be

so old.

I can’t even see the trees anymore,
snow-covered and sheltering
horses, or cows, some
warm-blooded thing that
has no need to know
the score, no notion

of who’s winning
or what’s on the line.

 

For Open Link Night at dVerse Poets. 

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The Ache Where I Drink Water

At first, I tried to shiver off these lights.
They scared me because I thought
the stars had fallen, were burning
in my arms. So much is different now,

but I’ve gotten used to them
and the other objects, the ache
where I drink water. The air

is dry, and there’s never any wind.
The noises are all different, the smells.

After what happened that day,
my neighbors and I tried to
figure it out, what we had done
wrong, what was happening then,
what would become of us next.
The wind was everywhere,

and I wasn’t pointed toward the sky
anymore. I am now, I guess. This is
peaceful, in its way. Still, there’s

a crow I miss, and so much
to tell him; I’ll be ready when
the truck comes, any day now,
to take me back home.

 

 

For Open Link Night at dVerse Poets.

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Do You Know What Today Is? (It’s My Blogiversary)

So, a little WordPress icon tells me that today is a big milestone. I knew it was coming up but had forgotten the actual day.

Once I found out, I was going to wax eloquent about what a great year I’ve had with this blog, what lies ahead, etc. and so forth, but what I feel like doing is just saying thank you so much for following, commenting, liking, or just dropping by now and then. It has meant so much to me. Truly.

Thank you, thank you, thank you … And now, here’s the song by Tony! Toni! Toné! that gave rise to the title of this blog post. Enjoy the slow jam (perhaps with that special someone?), and I’ll be in touch again soon with some thoughts on what I’ve learned this year and what I might do next.

 

 

 

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Meetings

Each tree is its own advertisement
against plastic bags. Bare branches
unwittingly hold dirty banners
that mutter there and sigh,
rubbing against the sky
like fingers on a balloon.

Somewhere other than this, the
Young Explorers Club is meeting,
ten boys in a church basement,
community center, or bingo hall,
someplace where it doesn’t
sound ridiculous, this pledge
to be a certain way and do
certain things.

Young Explorers promise, for example,
to remove plastic bags from trees,
when weather permits and when
they have built tall enough ladders
or long enough hooks, over the course
of many weeks. They also pledge

to take notice of things like
dead squirrels in alleys—
not to remove them, but
simply to take note, pause,
when they are out walking.

In this way, the Young Explorers think,
no life can ever be wasted. Crows know
the truth: that nothing ever is, not when
the world abounds with young explorers,

and all of them so hungry.

 

For Open Link Night at dVerse Poets. Also, it should be noted that the phrase Young Explorers Club is from Jesse S. Mitchell’s poem by that name. The title popped up in my inbox because I follow his blog, and my mind started working. Please be sure to check out his poem, too — it will give you a lot to think about.

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