Your words
Happy tokens
Lift my day
Like a brilliant kite
Riding a summer wind.
Innocent hope
Anchors the kit string
As if a child's hand
Relishing in the wonder of the moment.
A mysterious wind
Pulls the string taut
Before snapping
Inexplicably.
Your words
Little happy tokens
Swirl over the horizon, scattering
And the magic of the moment
Passes.
This Life
folded in decades
a school girl's note
loose leaf sheet
firmly creased
folded tightly.
This note, this Life
folded again and again
passed row to row
decade to decade
hand to hand
Name neatly printed atop.
This Life, this note
enthusiastically received
through weathered and worn
Finally recognized
Finally claimed
Finally, my own.
Yellowed loose leaf
unfolding to reveal
Life deliberately written
section by creased section
decade to decade.
My back garden has been demolished
Dessecrated layer by layer
Having dug like a demon for weeks
So strange, intentionally removing
All that once made it mine.
It hurts digging it all up
Witnessing it's demolition
After lovingly tending to it for so long.
Tonight,
Near dusk
It looks like a bomb's gone off.
The uncanny parallel to my failed marriage
Does not go unnoticed.
Imminent change loomsLife is quaint
My snow globed existence
Picturesque
Silent
Snowflakes of worry
whirl about my
winter wonderland
Static charged synthetic snow
Clings to drenched wool mittens
The more I dust off
The more snow envelopes me
crusted mitts swell to snow balls
snow balls becoming boulders
soon the sheer force
of the avalanche of anxiety
plummets towards me
Polyresin prison panes leave no escape
"STOP!" I cry
A lone voice trapped
unheard
In the vacuum void of my snow globe realm
Focus on the beauty of a single snowflake
Sit back
Breathe
Enjoy the snow.
"Hot cocoa anyone?"
We are each flawed
You. Me. Him. Her.
Accept me as fallible.
Expect me to screw up.
I’m only human.
Wanting acceptance
Instead of being asked
To be pure and virtuous.
This is who I am.
I am human.
I am flawed.
Accept me.
Realizing you're also flawed
While made in His image.
My scarlet letterIs “M” for mistake
But I learn
Each and every time.
We are human.
We are flawed.
Accept it.
I do.
I accept me...and it took a really long time.
Butterfly Garden
by Krystin Goodsell
Frolicking with glee are my babes in the back garden
Wanting to climb the vines vigorously reaching skyward
An ocean of pink, yellow and orange are the blossoms
Toiling, digging and planting scattered seeds
Their little green thumbs so eager to welcome new growth
Hovering in twitchy flight above are a trio of butterflies.
Fluttering freely around our heads, the trinity of butterflies
Plants to attract butterflies here in my garden
So difficult to resist their sweet smells and new growth
A rainbow of sweet peas aplenty stretching skyward
Four little hands, forty little fingers that scattered the seeds
Wistfully yearning to sooner stretch skyward in their blossom.
My family, the three of us will one day again blossom
Together a quintet of soaring monarch butterflies
Two little babes once were just seeds
Me, myself and I the garden
Always reaching skyward for the sun, climbing
Striving, entwining together in new growth.
Shelter from the rain, protecting the tender new growth
Aching for our haunted spirits to break forth into blossom
Always seeking, searching. Always winding and climbing.
Teased by the freedom of the flock of butterflies
Drawn here by my many species in the garden
Birds swooping to snack on the scattered seeds
Little green thumbs once scattered those seeds
Planted in dark damp dirt for new growth
Generations of family mirrors our bountiful garden
One day soon my own babes will blossom
And flutter away independently as do butterflies
I will do what it takes to assist their climbing.
Higher, higher always striving higher. Constant climbing
Scattered in our wake so many discarded seeds
Let’s flutter with ease among the butterflies
Reaching for the sun, hungry for new growth
Honeybees feeding from the blossoms
Come sit with us in the garden.
Continuously twisting and climbing
forging ahead with new growth
Scatter and plant new seeds
We must prepare for summer’s blossom
The wind scatters the butterflies off to other blossoming gardens.
