summer remembering

tia laughing near the clotheslines

half her face was smile

her skin dark on thin limbs

black hair sprinkled with flyaway grays

the smell of grass and honeysuckle

already smoked pot

already drunk beer

warm sunshine everywhere

June bugs buzzing

the water in the ditch trickling past

birds singing

kids crossing the highway to get

peanuts poured into glass coke bottles

salty and sweet

crossing the highway together

to get back to the house

where the knife cut the door

duck tape hiding the gashes

no one speaking of it then

everyone lived quiet

listening to the water trickling

birds singing

June bugs buzzing

escribí esto para mi tío – July 2021

The elders are going
One by one they take their leave
last breathes
Or whispered goodbyes
Sometimes without any words at all

Thin tall frames
Short lumpy ones too
Heads full with memories and songs
Ever varying shades of gray

They’ve gathered all their days
In a white cloth made of cotton
And tied them to a stick
With a string
And thrown them over shoulders

Waving off the June bugs
Dipping head and shoulders beneath the willows sway
Whistling or humming or singing as they walk off into the deep green

Or into the dessert beige
Beneath blues and reds and pinks
Mountain ranges wave as they pass
Sometimes silent as they go
Or with wide smiles and laughter recalled

I’ll not forget, I pray
The way you laughed
The rhythmic way you walked
Never

The breeze rises slow and strong
lifting dust from earth
gently falling down
Like the tears we weep at your leaving
I try but no thing makes your leaving less like your leaving

all day

all day today I waited for you

for you to come see

for you to come close and say

but when you did come you didn’t see

you didn’t say

the sky was far too blue

the waters far too fine

for anything like that

from you to me

or me to you

so we sat awhile in those chairs you like

and smoked a pile of leaves

writing in the ashes

then it was time for you to go again

and time for me to wave goodbye

with head bowed down

in the rooms living

down the hall

laughter rings

bouncing off of walls

dipping underneath archways

coming my way

in the next room voices deep

in that room little ones are arguing

she pleads her case

while she stands her ground

the water running in that sink sings

along to the tune from that pocket

the twang hums

the birds chirp

the smell of toast taosting

wafting in and out

in this room tears

for the hard talks had today

and so many other hard things

from today and yesterday

and last month

and all those other hard things

and days

and words

and blood stained stones

hard things from so long ago

bags and wagons and pockets full

of yesterday’s sorrows

of yesteryear’s hurts

of long past offences

and a million years of loss

piled up here

in this space

beneath these beams

on top of my head

February 2021 {yarnalong}

Even though the yarnalong link up isn’t happening just now — if I remember I am still sharing what I’m reading and knitting— it’s a nice practice to keeping a record.

I’m knitting Joanna’s cozy knee socks in a casual knit along for February ~ it’s a lovely free pattern that you can find here. I’m going quite slowly but I can tell they are a quick knit – if only one would decide to pick up the needles.

I finished reading and sometimes listening to Bless Me, Ultima which at first I loved and then decided wasn’t my style. I loved his familiar voice. I’m not sure what turned me in the end, it wasn’t the murder or magic, I think it was the gross boys he wrote. I’ll keep it on my shelves because of who wrote it and what he means to me personally as a New Mexican and a writer.

This week I am reading cookbooks, looking for inspiration. I’ve picked up the beautiful poems by Levi Romero again. I love his voice and it fills my brain and my rooms like music.

I’ve gotten half way through A Promised Land by Barack Obama. It’s really good and I’m glad to make my way through it however slowly I go.

I wrote before that the mostly quarantine calm of our Holidays this year were to us, “a kind of soothing balm to all of our scrapes and wounds that this strange year has brought us.”

But what I did not say, perhaps because the thoughts had not yet been processed, is that – the mostly quarantined calm of this last season of Holidays and weirdly even big days like this last Sunday’s Super Bowl left me with room for sadness and mourning.

I suppose this is another gift given by this pandemic. The unexpected quiet gives us space and time and to see and feel all the things that busy life didn’t leave us room for before. Just one more surprise, a sort of small grace. One more hard thing to be thankful for.

Winter is back. Although New Mexico isn’t the most Wintery type of place. I’m hungry for Spring and Summer. I’m letting myself begin to think about gardens and chickens and clothes hanging on clothes lines. I’m eager for sunshine and hot days and June bugs. For bare feet and slow walks, trampolines and lazy afternoons reading in the grass.

I sure hope we get there. I hope you get where you long for too.

Peace~ t