small stones catch up...well kinda...again lol

1/23/13

Going for a drive with Usher.
I'm picky today,
and he's the only one I'll allow to vibrate my....
speakers.

1/24/13

I hate the way the good ol boy
at the service station
stares at me,
as if I'm an abnormality,
as if i'm a circus sideshow,
as if I just perfected a magic trick,
all because I don't even have a PENIS,
yet I was able to pop the hood!

1/25/13

The waitress looks frazzled.
Not cause she's busy,
but because she's hungover.
I wanna ask her if she
slept over with a stranger,
puked on her shoes,
wore yesterday's clothes to work,
didn't wash her hair or body,
and attempted to cover it up with
a pea-soup-thick layer of cheap perfume.

1/22/13

My stepmom wrote in my husband's birthday card,
"Here is some money for gambling and new britches."
I glanced over it and thought it said,
"Here is some money for gambling and new bitches."
Mister IS going to Vegas.

1/21/2013

1/21/2013

The sun comes in sharper, clearer through the single-paned glass

on the 74 year-old door.

That same window filtered her sun

as she lived and as she died.

I snuggle in a blanket,

let it warm my face.

I wonder if the same window will shower sun on me when I'm 74.

It's still 37 years away,

but these first 37 have gone by fast.

 

catch-up! Whew! Small stones 1/17 to 1/20

1/17/13
She had no money and didn't know what she was going to do
when her daughter pulled up one day and dropped off three babies under five
with only a: "Take the damn things. I don't want them."
So she pulled out her sewing machine and started making them some clothes.
The next thing you know, she had raised them.
I have so much more than she does and also so much less.

1/18/2013
I dispersed the children off to school,
And then spent the afternoon collecting them up.
It reminded me of my grandmother... lost to Alzheimer's...
still trying to find her children at the non-existant bus stop.

1/19/13
The decrepit old man had to neglect using his cane
so that he can carry around a whole gallon of wine.
  I offer to help him, but he refuses my help.
He's trying to climb the rubber-tree plant.
He's trying to make off with a whole biscuit instead of just a crumb.

1/20/13
Cleaning out the attic makes me realize
how many of her things I never parted with.
The more I try to clear things out,
the murkier the water gets.

My autistic son smells my hair every morning to make sure that I'm still me. If I'm gone, and he get stressed, he's been known to bring my hairspray to his dad as if to ask, "Where is she?" Last night's power outage must have stressed him. I have spent all day trying to locate the hairspray that he apparently swiped sometime in the night.

In the Sunday Obits

In the obituaries, everybody went home to be with the Lord. It doesn't matter if he was the meanest sonofabitch alive or if she was the biggest whore on the block. They are all angels in the Sunday paper... gone home to be with the Lord. It takes the glory away from those who actually lived like saints. There they are, side-by-side, with the local drug dealer. They are ALL knockin on heaven's door, wakin in the arms of Jesus, walkin the streets of gold. (No matter, as mortals, how many drugs they sold.) It's like kids' sports teams everybody gets a trophy... doesn't matter if you're MVP or the waterboy. All trophies look the same. All rewards are the same. The church lady (who sat home with her impotent husband every night for 50 years, who never smoked, never drank, never cussed, never let her hair down,) is probably mightly pissed that Buffy, the local hooker from down the street, is right there beside her in the (SUNDAY!) obits getting the same accolades. Jesus, who made extra alcohol at parties, who hung out with prositutes at the watering hole, walks through the obits with the might-as-well-have-been-a-nun 70-year-old housewife just as frequently as he walks with Bambi, the party girl who had six husbands of her own and a few of y'alls too, just as frequently as he walks with Junior, who got himself fried stealing copper, or Jimmy who died in a meth lab explosion that he caused. They're all: red and yellow, black and white precious in his sight. Black and white and read all over and read over and over every Sunday in the obits.

1/15/2013

She tells him he has "grave-grass hair." He is bald, with just few stray sprigs. He says, "Yer a bitch," in the same manner that he would say, "Pass the peas." I love the banter that ensues when they dig up the hatchet and partake in the booze.

1/14/13

In the obituaries, everybody went home to be with the Lord. It doesn't matter he was the meanest sonofabitch alive or if she was the biggest whore on the block. They are all angels in the Sunday paper... gone home to be with the Lord.

1/13/2013

The wind blew the basement door open. This was the first time an escape hatch opened up for the obese, declawed, pristine white cat. He could not resist putting his pink toes in the grass, nibbling on it a little, walking out into the fresh water that drips from the sky. His first adventure! He showed up at my door at 5:00 a.m., meowing frantically! Subtitle: You almost lost me! You almost lost me!

1/12/2013

I walk behind an old lady who is driving a power chair. Her grandbaby is on her lap, hitching a ride. It's 70 degrees outside, but they have on toboggans (because that's how Grandmama dresses during "pneumonia weather.") His is red. Hers is white. A big head beside a small head, their tassels sway in the wind. I worry: What if, he jumps out of her arms? What if the chair's battery runs down on the street? But they seem relaxed in the sunshine. They are making it. I notice the pouch on the back of her chair holds: a diaper, a bottle, and a blue fuzzy blankey.

1/11/13

His mental illness has him thinking that I'm "an angel sent straight from God" And that I have divine ability to help him. He has told me so three times in a 10 minute conversation. I wish it were true.

1/10/2013

The yellow, long-haired, stray cat has dreadlocks. His whiskers are tangled. He's dusty. I would name him "Muppet" or "Raggamuffin." I would take him home and feed him. I would give him a bath. He has this look in his eyes that lets me know he would eat me alive.

1/9/13

Winter shaved away all the leaves and green, but he missed a strip of stubble that will grow to be the daffodil patch.

1/8/2013

I pick up a literary review and read a poem...I think. I wonder if the writer's goal was: Let me write something no one fucking understands. He couldn't give me an experience, a sensation, a feeling. I feel cheated. I wonder if he knows what the hell he means, Or if he's hoping someone will interpret his psyche for him. I don't have time for all that.

1/7/2013

The girl at the greasy burger joint announces that she has "come up pregnant"... not that she "got pregnant, which would imply that she had a role in it, and not that someone "made her pregnant," wich would put responsiblity on her fellar. No, sir! Nuh-uh! There's no accountability when someone "comes up pregnant"! It's one of those things that just comes up.

1/6/2013

Sometimes the knight in shining armor doesn't ride a horse. He drives a mini-van, but he can be depended on to work every day, And pick the kids up from school every evening. Sometimes the prince isn't rich. He doesn't have a castle or land, But he does win enough playing poker to get the money you need for Christmas or when an major appliance breaks down.

1/5/2013

Two black vertical bars divide the small basement window into three sections. Perfectly centered in the middle section is the solid black cat, a statuesque silhouette against a gray winter morning. Bare tree branches reach out to touch him. He contemplates reaching out to touch a bird, But he's done this enough to know about the glass As evidenced by a million triangular snot-smudge impressions.

1/4/13

"If the cat wipes his nose on me, does that mean he likes me? Oh! This is Taylor Swift!" she says. But when she gets excited, a baby word will slip in so it comes out "Tay-were Swiff". "If Tay-were Swiff comes in concert, can we go? Mama! My friend showed me how to do this thing ("fang"), and it's so funny! Want me to show you, Mama? Hey! In my magazine! Someone made the Roman Colosseum out of white chocolate! Would you like to have that much white chocolate?" How am I gonna find a stone today? I can't hear myself think! Ohhhh! Wait. There it is.

1-3-2013

A jet unzipped the morning sky's grey hoody, and I watched excitedly as his sunshine popped out.

1-2-2013

Chocolate strawberries, a glass of wine, bubble bath, and plenty of time, soft pajamas, flannel sheets, a good book to read, and 40 more winks? POP! Goes the daydream! It's 5 a.m. I wake up stressed, with PMS, and my hair's a mess. There are two sleepy kids who don't want to get dressed. I'm old. It's cold. Meanwhile, over in the corner, I hear the soft sound of the cat puking in the floor.

Small Stones 2013! Jan 1 :)

While cleaning, I found my great-uncle's old, tin ladle. Every morning he would draw a bucket of well water, cover it with a fresh, white towel, and set it by the door for all the June-sweaty kids to find. We all drank from the same ladle and dipped it back into the same bucket. Today it served up a refreshing sip from my childhood.