Patience

Morning:
6AM, no patience for the alarms
     Despite their chirping birds, rushing waterfalls, or melodic spirals
715, no patience for the coffee perc'ing, the Eggos toasting, the puppy playing
745 the lights, the cars, the children's buses all get in my way
                         So much for my time before work starts.

Work:
An hour or so of winding through towers of teetering totter, emails and research and planning and forms
At 10 the bell rings as a death knell for Duncan
     (My death is not murder, but no less betrayal)
     As streaming from haphazard lives sally forth the aching, the tired, the lazy, the burdened,
          The naiive, the dew-eyed, the kids wearing masks.

By 18 to 11 they've used up my patience:
I've answered their questions, I've told them my stories,
I've laughed at their jokes, and they've laughed at my foibles.
I've given them each my whole very best

And now, there is none for the rest.

Afternoon:
Twelve O'clock--Is it lunch? Can someone please handover the frozen dish I will munch?
Not quite enough time to finish the laugh, not enough to ingest while tasting some flavor.
The comments I choose must be carefully chosen as each spoken word only comes twice in a week
(There is too many'a showcase to describe of
To pause

For a second

To regain some peace.) And it's
Back
To the faces of unawares children
Not seeing the truths or experiences in life that I wish I had patience--
Or the luxury of patience--
To watch them grow into.
Instead it's more doldrum; the jokes have lost color.
The smile is now fake; the questions grow old.
Curiosity, once a praised beauty, is now only a hindrance that stops the

Evening:
4 or 5 or 630 or something, I pull in the driveway awaiting another adventure!

No adventure; we are too old for that.
Our new every morning is wrung out to dry by the time our home encompasses me.
The chipper puppy love brings a smile for a moment.
Cuddles are the only answer.

To restore peace to have patience:
Rest in the arms of the lover.
Dine on the savory indulgences of the day.
Leave behind the lost humanity of the day; it is gone with the questions in the wind.

Seek peace, seek peace, seek peace.

1004PM
11/13/13 egheck

Life on the Screen

Do you remember when I first loved you?
Do you think of the first time spoken?


There were crowds around me that day:
   crowds ambling on their way to business
   crowds nosing into the daily happenstance
   crowds peeping in to see our faces (mine in real time, yours, a mere picture on a screen)

I told you then. I TOLD you then:


"Of course I love you."




And now...it's all too true.

"Of course I love you," when you snore instead of smile.
"Of course I love you," when you point and prod after a long, hard day.
"Of course I do," when questions becomes accusing.
"Of course," as water drips from my ever-leaking eyes.

Damn allergic eyes.

The sand surrounds us and swallows us whole.
The noise external obliterates the sweetness of whispers.
The traffic blocks the easy walks.
The rage and pressures eviscerate the calm and comfort.
The town of desperation swallows us whole.



I'm sinking now,


          I'm sinking now,





  (I'm sinking now)

into a discomfort lined with razors (the pointed edges, not the flat).
The pinpricks that surround me leave me no wiggle, wriggle, giggle room--
I see a cool and comfy spot!




--Oh wait.



It's just reflections from
the daggers
from the daggers of the razor blades of
broken hopes of
shattered dreams of
pieces of your face in a screen.

"Don't believe what you see on T.V."

Almost.

"Don't believe what you don't see in reality."

"I celebrate & sing myself"

“I celebrate & sing myself”

(a poem inspired by Walt Whitman)

I sing myself in words that fill my life

                Words that share myself with yours

                              that share my heart with yours

                              that share my eyes with your imaginings

But I am ever blind, then see—

                again, again I learn again

                stories

                (and dreams)

                of who I am again.

Somedays I am the scholar, with unquenching thirst for knowledge and numbers

                (blind to feelings or practicality)

Somedays I am the homemaker, with aromas (paprika and pinesol)

                pervasive along with ordered chaos

Yet other days I am the sloth, with chocolate, popcorn, and tactile-glee

                (blind by shutting out the daily pressures on myself)

But most of all, on most of days

                I’m merely just the rolling tide of

                emotion, feeling, empathy, misery

                that I embrace with emerald pools for eyes.

                I share myself with you and take your share of you

                because only in our life together

                (with God & nature and water & things)

                does life mean anything in song

                               

Elizabeth Gay

1.11.2012

910am

Coffee, America's Unofficial Unity

Coffee, America's Unofficial Unity
      GREENVILLE, SC--She wakes to the sound of the OWL City ringtone on her phone. Rolling over, she glances at the screen blaring ten o'clock and realizes just how much work she has to do. And before another moment passes, Haley Harned is in the kitchen scooping out the first aromatic grounds of the day.
      Caffeine's allure wasn't why she started drinking coffee. But now, she is obsessive. She is dependent. Haley is addicted.