lunch on tuesday

I
caught a
glimpse of someone
in a shop-window who
looked exactly like
you circa
1999.

Where
are you
these days? What
are you doing? Isn’t
it silly that
we don’t
write?

how
much do
we defer to
museum, publisher, packaging, stage,
to filter, verify, validate, justify
the things we feel, see, believe?

Mom
sent a
bulb to me
through the post which
started to grow in transit.
When I opened the box, I
didn’t expect a plant, let alone the
pale, etiolated thing that stared out at me.
I popped him into a pot by the window.
I’d like to think I gave him a nice view.

We took to each other. We both liked light and
we were both tired of spending time in boxes.
I didn’t mind that he was somewhat spindly;
he never brought up the fact that
I’m bad about the watering thing.
We carried on, quiet friends,
until one day when
he bloomed the
most exuberant
red.

let
us build
dreams from stones
and reasons from rainstorms

tuscon
will always
be the place
where my grandpa can
summon rain by singing YEH-ta-hey!
and where grandma makes me feel
oh-so grown up by taking
me out to get
my first pair
of pierced
earrings

so many now instances
stitched together to
create beautiful
lifetimes

there
will be
one less pair
of socks next year
i’ll miss you so much

Only
certain people
will appreciate how
delightful it is to
discover ancient, decorated gingerbread men,
framed on a stranger’s dining-room wall.

What
does the
Jack of Spades
hold in his hand?

What was once a spear
has evolved into a strange thing
that defies deciphering, all because generations of
artisans reproduced their predecessors’ work, without referencing the
original sources: an elaborate game of visual Chinese Whispers.

do
you remember
times gone by
when we had to
make plans in advance and
keep to them because
there were no
mobile phone
excuses?