RiverSedge, 19:2, 2006
Celebrations are tumbleweeds,
Her family on the fringe.
They spin in circles in the kitchen,
Spring in someone’s desperate eyes
Where clumped ideas
Mold shared broken memories
To sure future accord.
Birthdays, anniversaries, occasions
Each a cloud of eddied dirt,
Speck-flecks of try-too-hard
To gather.
Glued with glum
Gray resignation,
Each excuse well-heeled and worn out,
Even continents aren’t just cause
For an absence in her place.
Ever conscious of the dreary face of
Incoherent insult,
Easy rejection of the invite dies
Like curled leaf on her tongue.
And so she travels, days.
And so she stands on the welcome mat,
And holds a pocketful of wry regret
Before the vacuum of reunion drains her light.