Scrapbook Poetry

Poems inspired by old pictures.

This is Someday

Please don't pine 
for cleaner light,
a stiffer spine, 
a warmer night,
low risk, 
or timid prey. 
Where morning breaks,
this is someday.

Mud

I think, even when we’re old, we’re going to stand around in circles wondering if we’ve done things right while our heels sink into the mud.

We’re going to watch the annuals droop and the perennials pop their necks out of the dirt every damn spring.

And when we’re old, we’re still going to marvel at the flabby caterpillars that roll up and change right in front of us and relish the scent of the roses even though we’ve been trimming their thorns for decades. 

Rambler

She hunts for frogs
Cause when they’re in her hand 
She is more
Than a little girl 

She kicks across the lake
Cause when she grabs the far end
She is more 
Than a little girl 

She plows through mud puddles
Cause when they slosh and stick 
She is more 
Than a little girl 

She rips the roots of dandelions 
Cause when they drift
She is more 
Than a little girl

She stomps and keeps stomping
Cause fine folk tell her
She is just 
A little girl

Getting Old

I’ve watched this western
Start to finish
Over and over
And over again

What's going to happen 
The day it gets old?

Suitcases by the Car

Your parents put on flip-flops to drive the van from the suburbs to the city to the country to the coast switching back and forth to let each other sleep. You prop up on the arm rest so you can watch the stars and the sunrise and point at cattle on the side of the road. There’s a beach ball blocking the back window but your parents don’t need to see. They drive in the dark and in the rain and even when your brother bugs you in the back seat. And they threaten to turn this car around but they never will. You know they never will. There are too many shells to gather and gulls to spot. Grains of sand to feel between your fingers. Restaurants to debate. And you end up ordering coconut shrimp even though it’s too sweet because your mom ordered it first and she eats it with her hands. And when you walk barefoot to the ice machines at the motel next to the sand dunes you feel like a family of explorers. And for just a second on your towel by the surf you think you’ll never go home and you’re happier than the cumulonimbus clouds that cling to the sky like Cool Whip.

But you only packed enough underwear for the weekend.

In the Morning

In the morning,
I’ll see you 
Lacquered in light 
A tranquil view 
But a heavy sight 

A feathered truth 
Sharp to know 
Gone yesterday 
In a lucky snow

Steady

When the love stops sometime 
I’ll stay steady 
Frowning at your toothbrush 
And odd hobbies

At your unorganized
Side of the dresser
And that smudge on the mirror 
You forgot to clean 

And you really should
Take better care of your middle 
And your memory 
And me!

When the love stops sometime
We’ll call it even
And keep keeping 
Because the past takes up so much space

And nobody else can handle 
Folding your striped socks
And the way you chomp 
And fuss 

And you really should 
Get out in the sun 
And take deeper breaths 
And kiss me before you walk away! 

The Winners

And what, then? 
When the sun is so bright? 
When the day is so good
And frothy and light? 
Which way will we go?
Who will we bite? 
How will we bond? 
What will we fight? 

The Dirty Thirties

They were the knowing girls 
The three-day curls
The penny scrape 
And always pearls 

They kept ship-shape
Squished kids in cars
Rationed Wax Bottles and heartache
Ignored the stars 

Stopped wasteful  
Wasteful yearning and waning 
Because luck kissed the ladies who never pecked for a clover or yelled into a well 
Just complaining 

Soar

A green plastic saucer 
In a nest of wood chips 
Six girls 
An endless spin
Surf in the center 
One at a time
Height order or age order 
Or a hierarchy of their own design 
One falls, they laugh
Falls, they laugh
Until the last, the littlest, 
Rises on wobbly legs 
Spreads her toothpick wings 
Sails in tight circles 
Her center of gravity untested 
Then,
That girl
Throws herself off balance 
Flails and falls 
And mimics nausea 
Just to fit in with the others

Girl

They said be careful
and I asked why
and they never stopped talking again

Troupe

We will dazzle
Show our teeth
And kick the mark 

And if life is the slow-close
of the final curtain 
We will dance until it’s dark