Fur Traders Descending the Missouri

George Caleb Bingham: 1845

Forgetfulness and faded things

I am overwhelmed at the moment, I have taken on too many tasks. Not only looking after (or visiting or caring for) three small children, husband, parents, grandparents, sisters, sister in law, nieces, nephew and friends...plus neighbours, chickens, dog, guinea pigs, vegetable garden, flower borders...

And don't get me wrong, all of this delights me, I adore my wonderful, sprawling extended family and life, however, right now, with dissertation deadline looming and new teaching course assignments to complete and poetry to read for friends or judge in a poetry democracy comp or CV to write or poetry pamphlet to proof....

Well, I may have a bit too much on at the moment.

I know this because I keep forgetting things. Things I should know. How to make pancakes. What I walked into the room to do. A child coming back to mine for tea. Double booking my days. Thinking I posted an item and then finding it on my desk.

Also I get distracted by small things; the shade of a faded leaf fluttering on the birch tree. The colour of the lettuce plants as they burst through the compost. An old photograph that makes me sit on the stairs and forget why I was going upstairs.

I just remembered I am also reading The Mill on the Floss for book group each night, before I fall asleep and forget the pages I just read.

30: Last day

Been a strange month for poems. When the children were off school I couldn't work on my masters dissertation but I could write a poem so I got the first 12 done. Then they went back to school and I had to concentrate on my studies. I have managed to write poems over the last few days, well, not polished poems, just ideas and thoughts about things.

Jo Bell's prompt for today is to write a love poem. Put everything into it, she said, make it the best you have ever written! It's not the best, but it's an image saturated in love, my love for the object of the poem I suppose, that has played in my mind and I wanted to try and turn it into words.

Framed by the wooden

Gnarled doorframe

Side view, head bowed

Naked from the waist up

Chest and arm tensed

Holding the heavy axe

Gaze heavy and low

Black hair falling over

Brow, dark eyes, straight

Nose, plump lips cannot

Disguise the melancholy

The woodcutter shifts

The axe and shoulders

His sadness until she

Takes him in her arms

And whispers something

29:

Prompt from Carrie Etter today:

Write an ode to your favourite vegetable. For inspiration, here's Pablo Neruda's "Ode to the Artichoke."


I haven't managed a poem, just a series of thoughts really, about vegetables!


chopping vegetables to make soup is my therapy
as is watching chickens interact with one another
or walking the dog through different weathers
but if I cannnot get outside to talk to hens
or raise my spirts enough to pace the fields,
making soup is there to chase the shadow away
using up what ever vegetables or pulses
i can find feels frugal and pure.
I like them all, mishapen or lumpen
they can all be chopped and boiled
into broth to feed the family
I cannot pick a favourite: I like them all

28:

Today there were eight of them,

sat in the best seats,

sipping the same cappuccino

for hours, until the froth

had flumped.

And all with an infant

crooked in an arm,

flopped on a shoulder.

He sips an espresso so scorching

it scalds his tongue but still

he cannot stop mumbling swear

words under his breath.

Why do they flock here?

The chitter-chatter of mothers

sounds like a pod of dolphins

clicking and splashing, the babies

mewing and squawking until

one by one they disappear

into folds of clothes

attached to nipples;

warm milk on demand

                  and they never pay.

27:

The family in the house
at the end of the lane
left suddenly, leaving
their possessions
and owing rent.

Last night I  looked
into their shed for flowerpots
and saw wedding cards,
broken family pictures
and a grey vibrator.

They had only been
there six months,
seemed happy..their kid
played with ours.

Then the man was on
my doorstep one day, tears
running down his skin:
I didn't let him in.

I sensed if I comforted
him he might never leave
and I hardly knew his ways

as he told me how
she had been having
an affair for five years
and their child was four.

Poem for Sunil Tripathi

Last week I heard the name Sunil Tripathi. It was being flamed all over twitter and the internet as the name of the Boston bomber. He was a 22yr old missing person and his family were desperately searching for him. I took one look at the picture of him and could see it wasn't him. He looked very different to the suspect in the white hat but people were so eager to attach a name, any name, so they could tweet it and feel useful? clever? I don't know.

 I was already feeling furious that only certain types of people (those with brown skin tones) were being circled by over eager amateur detectives. Massive assumptions were being made and one 17yr old had already been put on the front page of a newspaper with implied accusation. I was indignant and appalled that this was happening in the race to find the culprits. As one commentator stated, it became a racist 'where's Wally.'

Once the mistake was realised about Sunil, that he was innocent of any crime, some of the people who had so willingly spread the lie apologised to his family. Meanwhile, his family were still searching for him.They had set up a facebook page, asking people to write a message of love and support to Sunil.

I felt very moved by this situation and added a hand picture, my little boy's hand. I hoped Sunil would come home, hoped he was on a journey and would come back safe.

When I found out yesterday that a body had been recovered from the Providence river I was devastated. It was such a tragic situation for his family and I wished I could reach out and comfort them. Sunil was the youngest son. He had two siblings. Eldest was a daughter, then the two sons. The same as my children. My sons are also dark skinned, with dark brown eyes; I always empathise with any painful situation but this was especially poignant.

 Because it was so unfair that he was falsely accused. Because his family and all those who posted hands of hope were wishing, or praying for a happy ending. I was angry at first, asking why? Why do these things happen, why is there so much pain? There is no answer. Only that life is hard and sometimes becomes too much for people. I have been close to that myself so I understand how someone could choose to end it.

As I thought about it I knew he had been on this earth for a reason. To bring his family joy, even if it was for only a brief time. Each of those 22 years he made a difference in the lives of those around him and they will always remember him. Even people like me, who never met him, will remember him from the words his family used to describe him and the love that burned in their eyes as they talked about him and the pictures of his smile.

His family posted these words:


'This last month has changed our lives forever, and we hope it will change yours too. Take care of one another. Be gentle, be compassionate. Be open to letting someone in when it is you who is faltering. Lend your hand. We need it. The world needs it'




I wrote this poem for Sunil, just a small thing but my way of trying to understand all the feelings I have had over the last week as the search for him occupied my mind. All my thoughts are with his family as they grieve for their brother, son, nephew, friend.





A leaf that unfurls for one summer
still had a purpose, for that season
it grew and joined the canopy.

Green and beautiful it made shade
for any resting below, kind respite 
from the harsh burn of the sun.

Autumn, Winter the tree is bare
but the memory of that leaf
is still there: that cannot be undone.