New Grant from Pat Kind Foundation - Poem: A Trip to the Compost Heap

A watched pot never boils, I reminded myself, as I waited until mid-April to hear from The Patricia Kind Family Foundation.

I was positive it would not come today, as Mailman Joe plunked the mail in the handpainted mail box. I
took it to the kitchen table, threw out the huge bundle of ads, then tossed everything in the cardboard box to be recycled and there she was.

Should I wait before opening it? I wondered.

I was actually afraid they would send us nothing. Instead, inside lay a check for $5,000.

Relief but sorrow, too. I'd expected $10,000.

Wrote a lovely thank-you letter stating what an honor it is to be among the wonderful organizations they fund.

As is my wont, I drove to the PO - hmmm, I wondered - where is that Abington post office, it's the closest, I knew it was on the way to our church, and then - presto - I found it and mailed it off. They should get my letter the morrow and then I'll send New Directions a note.

Drove to American Heritage and had a long wait since they only had two tellers. I turned around and said, Chrissie, there's a long wait up here.

They didn't send anyone else up.

My teller was named Amy. Oh, I blabbered while she was processing the check, I have a sister Amy in Oregon, where she's a librarian. Amy had never been there.

I asked her what she'd do if she got a check for 5 grand. I forget her exact words.... something like put  away more money to buy a house.

Sez I.... I'm gonna buy a spaghetti and meatball dinner and that I did.

Ate half at the restaurant and ate half for tonite's dinner.

Oh dear, just checked my blood sugar. Will ride my bike while reading some fiction. The Sue Klebold book is quite interesting, but I desperately miss reading fiction.

***
So I'm at the library reading The Violet Hour, which is due today. It's about the last hours of great writers. I'm reading about John Updike. He had lots of affairs and then reading about the charismatic Dylan Thomas, who women adored and he adored them back.

There's just not time to finish them all so a bell dings in my mind and I return it. BTW, while I was reading - I found me a reading nook I'd never seen before - I did fall asleep several times. Across from me was an extremely sad black woman, youngish, a great hairdo, but so sad looking.

Under the influence of Sue Klebold who never intervened with her son, I wondered if a kind word to the young woman might save her from suicide. She was wearing a U S Army shirt.

Never said anything to her as she was reading her smart phone and her expression changed several times on her face.... from sorrow and tears.... to happiness.

***
On my way out I said goodbye to Dennis. He recognized me when I first walked past him. We hugged and kissed.

Of course I recognize you, Dennis! I said.

He was with his case manager Jenn who works in the Willow Grove division of Central Montgomery County. Dennis is gonna work with a job coach and get himself a job.

He's also getting an award from Montgomery County Behavioral Services.

***

I've given up caffeine for a while. Two days w/o sleep is no fun at all, esp. in the nighttime. There is absolutely nothing to do in the middle of the nite unless I wanna go outside and pretend I'm a wolf howling at the moon.

Here's what I'm sipping on now

The flavor is WEAK. I'm thinking of returning it to the Giant. Should I?


A TRIP TO THE COMPOST HEAP

O waning Gibbous Moon
shine on me
as I hobble like a
Chinese princess with
bound feet, carrying
vessel of what once
was a live chicken
clucking with her
savory sisters in the
morning light

Reduced now to white
bones and white meat
which I toss gently
on the compost heap
with nary a prayer of
thanks

Would they - cluck cluck -
hear me now? Something
hears me, be it fox or
deer or skunk, but silent
stay I, in the morning
dem bones will all be
et, for matter is neither
created nor destroyed

As overseas the sounds
of rifles firing, grenades
shattering skulls and
kneecaps are mourned
by the waning Gibbous Moon.

Great writer from Africa - Cleaning up the winter debris from my yard - Breakfast with Helene - Poem: Helene's Last Stop

  Helen Oyeyemi was the guest writer on WellRead.org.

She was writing books but no one would publish her. Okay, she told herself, if I can't sell this one, I'm through!

Fortunately, she got it published. She said she reads loads of books, spending more time reading than writing.

I just chanced upon this PBS show.

***

 Lilac tree, which you can barely make out.

 After attending the Willow Grove Bible Church's Coffeegrounds, I couldn't sleep, having drank a couple cups of Black Currant Tea. Was up till four in the morning.

So at around two a.m. I lit up the back porch deck with a couple of indoor lights and raked and swept the back deck getting rid of all the dead leaves and new seedlings from the back yard maple.

Swept them all into a big sheet, then wrapped it up like a baby and sprinkled it to the side of my rusty shed. Then I kicked the debris all over so animals wouldn't build a nest inside.

Animals will do what they will. Scott laid traps and we caught four mice, using the best peanut butter available... from Whole Foods.

See the lil patch of sawdust? Bees of some sort are boring holds in the unpainted railing, built by one Dave Small. Will ask my friend Beatriz about the pollinator who bore the holes.

 Woke up this morning at 7 a.m.  As usual, I fantasized about going out for breakfast, and suddenly had a great idea.

Jumped out of bed and called my friend Helene who lives at Rydal Park and hates every minute of it.

May I come over for breakfast? I asked.

I was there w/i fifteen minutes. The trick is to look for Wells Fargo on the left and then turn left.

 She enjoyed her breakfast.

I ate Eggs Over Easy on Toasted English Muffins, 2 slices of bacon, and 2 cold glasses of delicious water.

Poem about her below.

 Scott's dogwood tree. Helene's late husband, the most clever Aaron Ryesky, would call these dagwood trees.

I was ecstatic when Scott said he wanted to go bike riding. Our first of the year, though both of us vigorously ride our stationery bikes indoors.

Scott reminded me that we special-ordered my FORWARD-PEDALING BIKE from Wheelright of Abington, which, alas, has gone out of biz.  So long Miko and his wife and their little dog Bruno.

We went to the Pennypack Trail by the Huntingdon Valley post office. It was mobbed. We wondered if Josh Shapiro, who's running for Atty Gen and his family would be out riding. He was instrumental in getting the Trail built.

Truthfully I was terrified when I got on the bike. I can ride fine but it's dodging the other bikers that's hard and I'm afraid I'll fall to my death down the cliff.

For tomro nite, I've gotta compose an Ode. Was thinking of writing it to Sue Klebold, mother of shooter Dylan of Columbine High School. Started composing it on my stationery bike. Nope, I thought. Too hard. Other ideas? Bike riding, Scott, Passover.

Bridge Mix was one of the desserts Natalie Sherman put out. Mon dieu was that delicious!

HELENE'S LAST STOP

Her early morning breakfast
was her favorite meal
at the home
Mini-shredded wheat soaked
in milk with coins of bananas
within. "I must tell you
about a book I'm reading,"
she said, after patting the
corners of her mouth.

"The Lost Landscape," by
Joyce Carol Oates. My eye-
brows raised. "It's the way she writes,"
she said. "A memoir."

I wrote it down. Meantime
the tables were filling up: David
and his robbing the cradle girl-
friend Rita, Joan who did nothing
all day, she told me, and a tall
Sir berobed and wearing
flannel pajamas. Why not?
This was his home now.
His last stop.

Talk centered around Pass-
over. We had hamtaschens
at ours, I said with a straight
face. There was nothing to
smile about at this memoir
of old age, wheelchairs -
Henry sat in one - and the
kindness of strangers. That
Terrence made me eggs over
easy on an English muffin
with a side of bacon.
Why not? Death will come
when it will.

I kissed Helene goodbye.
"I love you," I said, telling
her to hurry to her room
to put Scott's dogwood
in water. Its skin-like petals
were beginning to wilt.
Hurry hurry, while life lives
within.

Happy Birthday Queen Elizabeth - Poem: The Elderly Couple

I knew I had to write one of my Facebook poems for the queen.

Her birthday was April 21. She was 90 years old.

THE ELDERLY COUPLE

Beloved by all who know them
except perhaps for a
jet-setting daughter-in-law
they are plain people
highly educated
with a pedigree finer
than any
Sealyham Terrier at
the Crufts Dog Show

Celebrating her ninetieth
she walks on the cobblestones
outside her roomy home,
her beloved
Philip always her
protector, as
neighbors flock
round her to shake
her hand and touch
the elegant proper
white gloves.

Blue-eyed, white haired
Elizabeth Alexandra Mary
a string of glittering pearls
around her neck and
the hat we're
accustomed to see

Remains a symbol of stability
and righteousness
in a world ringed with
despair

As we cry Long live the Queen
Long live the Queen!

PART TWO: Three poems: You Were Part of my World (about George Schuler) - Facebook - Welcome Harriet Tubman

So, as I previously mentioned in Part One, I was gonna submit these to an online lit mag that folded.



YOU WERE PART OF MY WORLD

Oh, George, my silent tears fall for you
We both were walkers on Cowbell Road
You were impressed when I told you
my dad was a Marine
You would attend their reunions
all over the country
With a laugh you'd say
Less and less of us every year

You and Elinor finally invited
me over for lunch
Big stone fireplace in the
living room, where you sat
and shouted across the
room. Marines do not
wear hearing aids.

The tuna fish on toast
was good but best was
the house tour. Photos from
your trips around the world
an African safari sans Francis
McComber from Hemingway.

You would take the dining car
from Jenkintown to New York
where you worked in a fancy
office with a secretary

The dining car now gone
Elinor now gone
Your athletic walks gone
though you did them "in the
old ladies home" as you
called it

George, you fought in the
Pacific and told me you
were that rare bird -
an atheist in a fox hole -
but might I tell you a
secret?

You shall never be gone.
Never never never.
For you are my George on
the bottom of Cowbell Road
and I am the Belle in the middle
and you will always be the Beau.
I refuse to let you go. 

So there! Many things live
then perish. You? Never.

***



FACEBOOK

I was going to eat my
afternoon salad - spinach
and cheddar cheese, golden
mushrooms and tiny green
scallions that crunch in
your mouth

And then I remembered!

They are waiting for me
on Facebook.

Iris and Fran, David and
Martha and the 300
Friends I have accrued
over the years

I must tell you I do not
"like" everyone. I do not want
to know the business of a
young mother whose
husband mistreats her

Leave the bastard, like I
left mine.

Does Facebook have
approval ratings as
the president does?

I am pressured - by
myself, I admit - to
find things "my friends" like.

No one cared when I
listed the winners of
the Pulitzer Prize, so
dash that!

They like photos of
what my boyfriend
gives me on holidays.
The Valentine's flowers
remain alive.

As we grow older and
weary, we need not
obey the demands
of Facebook.

I shall eat my salad,
then go outdoors in
the glorious sunshine,
smell the lilacs newly
blooming in the back yard
and marvel at the bumblebees
who know the exact moment
to exit their hives.

***


View Times story here.

Harriet Tubman will appear on the $20 bill, replacing slaveholder Andrew Jackson's visage. 

WELCOME HARRIET TUBMAN

In ten long years, I shall
hold in my hand the newly
newly minted twenty-dollar bill
with your brave head gazing
upward.

Never-whipped-into submission
by Simon Legree, 
you held your head high and
with the fierceness of a
tigress meandered through
woods and gullies,
guiding your people home.

Now looking down upon the
America you hardly know,
you must be pleased to
see the copper-skinned
people taking their
rightful places
at the table.

The long arc of
Justice has finally won.

***

Meet Ron DiMarco, metal collector from the bottom of Cowbell Road. I gave him a broken solar light plus the stick that holds it in.

He makes $4 per ton... is that what he said? The whole load - and the truck was full! - will pay him $20. He said he's retired and is a metalsmith, fashioning things out of metal and also of copper.

Watched the difficult Aussie film Felony.

 
While driving Scott to the train - I needed to go to the libe - I explained the film to him to better my mind.

Total mice caught under the kitchen counter - four.

Last nite I found a dead one in the trap and first thing today brought it into the trash, which was picked up this morning.

This is very difficult to do, but if Linda Myers across the street can do it, so can I.

I have one very odious task to do now.... sending a friend's work to a lit mag.... so I'll treat myself by munching on popcorn.