Telling Stories

Relationships and occupations
death in the family
and other amputations
weddings and grocery shopping.
Life offers up bumps and twists
at every stage we travel through.
Racism, sexism,
just I-don’t-want-to-know-you.
Chest pain, stomach ache, swine flu,
and better and worse are the
land mines we negotiate trying
to keep our souls in tact.

Endings, standings,
delivering come-uppings,
births and christenings.
Finding acceptance.
Hugging a bigot or keeping your distance.
Successful surgeries, bed rest
meditation and medications
that pull us from the edge
bringing us back for more of this.

It’s all part of the journey.
To each of us our portions of
crazy and volatile with
a measure of calm mixed in.
Plain sailing then is
a matter of perception
and depends on
what gumption we bring
to each situation.

© 2010 Shari Lynne Smothers

This poem is for the napowrimo prompt #24, find a phrase Visit the post to see the details of this prompt. “Plain sailing” caught and kept my attention.

Everywhere I look
I see the poetry
life offers up
for the open heart
to enjoy.

And I do.

Cotton blossom scent
of my favorite candle,
humorously outrageous
contorted faces
reacting to the very opposite
malodorous skunk aroma.
Waving leaves on trees
on an otherwise still day
give the strong impression
I’m watching them growing.

Even the gentle flurry
of the curtain rolling over
the soft breeze
through the open window
makes my mind smile.

All the soft, pretty, pleasant,
quiet sides of being alive
can cocoon me
and I get rejuvenated,
apart from the draining
aspects of my days.

© 2010 Shari Lynne Smothers

In my favorite dreams
there is promise
of a great future
that could be ours now
if only those most completely indoctrinated
would let go of the hatred,
the seething, contemptuous loathing
for people of different ilk and ideology.

In my clearest dreams,
disagreements
can get loud
but never solicit
violence, murder of children
through slanderous provocative
speech
reminiscent of
    —you remember

or vandalizing buildings
terrorizing men and women
and by relation their children,
all because they didn’t
agree with their opposition.

Today I’m grateful for the haters,
though their vile words are
shouted loudest and from every venue,
from high places, bombed down
on the heads of the innocent;
from below, seeping up and infecting
all who are touched by it;

I’m grateful that, in my worst dreams
just like in my reality
they are in the minority.

© 2010 Shari Lynne Smothers

Every day there’s something disgusting making the news. I’m bombarded with the images that my imagination contrives, based on the vile and scary things I’ve heard discussed. This post is another shaped, in part, by the news. I write it in hopes that I can one day wrap my mind around certain actions.

Clearing my throat to say
what’s on my mind,
with a big broom
I pushed away from the tip of my tongue
the frustration of the day’s news
today’s job search results,
update that my niece is still sick.

I dismissed calls to DO NOT CALL
to register the family phones.
Nothing to say about tweeting
reading or posts I worked on.
Meals were just food to eat
with nothing fun to drink.

Dishes washed late last night
I put away before writing.
Washed the others throughout the day,
saved them all but the one
I drank from and returned
to my desk to write something great.

But, nothing surfaced as something tasty.

© 2010 Shari Lynne Smothers

There was this sign
so high up and
in constant motion.
I felt I should
but I never slowed to
try to read it.

Then one day a heavy storm blew it down
and finally I could see its message:

Will it go round in circles? Will it fly high like a bird up in the sky?

So then I considered the full
lyrics of the song
because surely
that’s what it was telling me to do.
And I wondered
What the hell does that mean?
It wasn’t until I got to
the dancing part
that I thought I could
follow a train of thought:

I’ve got a dance, I ain’t got no steps. I’m gonna let the music move me around.

It wasn’t long
before I took from it
what I needed:
Yes, I can definitely get with
going with the flow.

© 2010 Shari Lynne Smothers

---

From the lyrics of “Will it Go Round” by Billy Preston
Will it go round in circles? Will it fly high like a bird up in the sky?
I’ve got a dance, I ain’t got no steps. I’m gonna let the music move me around.

Through this life I travel
growing, changing, being changed.
My only constant the Self
the core me I can always recognize.

We are here for an unknown finite duration
moving through this ethereal passage.

Present with no reason why I’m here
in my youth I happened upon this affinity
grown into a hope a chance dream
to leave my mark with even one verse
that time will hold on to.

Through this passage we’re each alone
even in the company of others.

Without understanding it,
breathing is to sit with paper
and scribble thoughts that come to me.
Equally as unrelenting and unfathomable
is the desire to share with even one person.

If I had to choose having
a companion through this nebulous ephemeral passage
until our time together is done,
or having a verse known through millennia
I might actually lay down my pen
to share my limited time with one who gets me.
I might…

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Take the phrase “Through this (blank),” replace the blank with a word or phrase, make the new phrase the title of your poem, and then, write your poem. Day 28 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge from Poetic Asides

Somewhere we lose sensitivity to loud music
or someone says it’s time to get over it.
At parties in high school the DJ blares music
as if the goal is to sabotage your game.

No way can you hear
the person your dancing with
so no point in trying to
talk inside the room.

Or maybe that’s the point,
to get you outside alone
together under the pretext
you’ve important things to say.

But then, stepping outside
finds you among other couples
with equally important things
to share with each other.

Oddly the silence is so loud
until your every breath shatters it,
carried out to others around
and your words thunder toward them.

The sonorous crossroads present
the choices between the decibels topping
well over one hundred forty
or the resounding silence
that resonates every word, every sound.

And as you stand outside
gazing in your date’s eyes
you’re serenaded by the sounds
of kissing so loudly in the bloody silence
until you blush with embarrassment.

Finally it’s nearing midnight.
The couples separate their lips and bodies,
trickle back inside, teasing and cavorting
in raucous self-congratulations.

Your parents will arrive soon
to collect you. And so you’re spared
the dramatic decision of where to be.
Dad says be waiting for me;
that has to mean outside.

If you’re going to say anything,
you better make it quick.

No. There will be time enough to say stuff,
better occasions with no noises sabotaging
when you can be assured only
the ears meant for your message can hear it.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write a poem filled with noise. Day 23 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, at Poetry Asides with Robert Lee Brewer

How is it you can know
which way to go next?
What are your guideposts
to know when and where
to turn off your present path?

For me, there’s no better
indicator,
after extending
every benefit of the doubt
to a person,
than to have him return
only to eat my lunch
and lick the plate after.

©2009 by Shari Lynne Smothers