I wrote this poem by picking 5 words/phrases at random out of a bowl; paper dolls, sandlot, union man, froth and ethics. This is one of the prompts you can find at the Figures of Speech poetry reading and open mic held every third Tuesday at In Other Words Books.

I see your grizzled face looking
90 years too old,
and shake my head, trying
to remember  the gently laughing
eyes that saw too much
before playing innocent games
or finger painting bright colors.

I see your bloated belly,
rumbling with angry beasts
ready to tear down the house
they took over piece by piece
killing you in an alcoholic rage;
My eyes search desperately for
remnants of the 8 mm movie
where a toddler runs the bases,
falling dramatically when
tagged out by his older brother.
Now, you’ve had your third strike
and I am out, out of breath
watching your fitful breaths
and out of words for how I feel.

I hold your grizzled hand,
bloodied from pounding your
pain through shocked walls.
Where is the gentle that held
babies, taught auto mechanics,
went camping and made love?

I look into vacant eyes moving
to a fevered tune.
What?  What, I want to ask
is the meaning of pain;
pain you held in so long,
pain that blurted out through
angry lips yelling vodka lies
and smelling of fear?

What was the use of hiding it all
only to find it seeping from every pore,
telling your awful secrets in
jaundiced stutters and
incomprehensible rhythms?

I sit, numb and disbelieving
and see a faint resemblance,
a hint of my own face in your
dull and dying eyes.  To hide,
to seek safety in self denying lies
is a road with one ending,
and I see it lying there on
clean sheets, kept breathing
by plastic lines and wires.

You half sit up, turning to me,
mute, but from every star,
screaming stop!

perfect self; strong enough to stand,

supple enough to bend into the wind

being yourself… whole.

When they are here the earth is in balance, as are we.

When they disappear, the silence of sound is deafening.

They dance and sing and flit their colors about,

Take a chance”, they seem to say, “Open your heart out.”

So when you see their feathers upon the ground

It’s like a calling card, announcing they’re around.

And written there in ancient cryptic rhyme

A word or two; you see yours, I see mine.

So read them with your heart, but keep in mind,

The words are writ anew in flowing time.

And this feather is telling me the longest day is gone;

And quietly the minutes will become a fading song.

So as I walk my garden path please let my eyes be clear,

And read the lines in leaf and dirt my work has written here.

I haven’t the right to forget even

one painful moment in my short life.

Even the little memories have

a sort of knife in their hands,

carving out a fine relief in my

face now telling you lies.

I only wanted to keep you

safe from an unpleasant truth,

but the knife cut both ways,

and now we two have mirror

image lines in the story of our

long embrace.

this path is littered with my

broken dreams and not yet real

hopes.

They crunch as I step gingerly

over the bumps and gullies,

trying desperately not to stumble,

like a child first learning to walk

or running from some imagined

monster waving wildly

before her eyes.

If ever there was a time for

faith of the certain kind, it will

be when I am thus lost at home,

taking one more plunge into

the deep of my longings.

in a world of artists making

gardens out of airy thoughts

and bits of broken metal and

twisted branches.

After the first wild thing

went up next door, I broke ranks

with my complacency and

made a stab at childish art.

The end result was less a finished

product, than a quiet reminder

of my possibility.

And then the strange words

flowed as if to mock my self

deprecation and danced without

shame before my eyes.

Without a place to hide, I

wrote again and again and again,

plastering my beauty in

words now far beyond my

mortal grasp.