Context is Everything

Context is everything
Two days ago I was working to fix a massive derailment
The trains had run off the tracks near a tunnel
Trains were everywhere
Cars had become tangled up in the wreck as well
Everything had been brought to a standstill
I helped to bring some order to the situationand
Get the trains running again
I was told I did a good job
By my boss
He also called me honey
His exact words were
Good job honey
I laughed and gave him a hug and
Three goldfish crackers

But you're home all day

But you’re home all day
That’s what they say
When I get defensive over thirty minutes
We were just thirty minutes early and
You were home with them all day
If they don’t actually say it
They think it but
Do they think about
My shower or
School
Drop off and pick up
The quality time that is
Breakfast and
Lunch
Complete with
Flying nuggets
Tipping chairs and
Mad dashes to the bathroom
Nap
Grocery shopping
Meal preparation
Complete with
Parallel play with pots and pans
Screaming
At each other
The cat and
Me and
Mad dashes to the bathroom
The part time job
Orchestrated phone calls
Tooth brushing
Toy pick up
And
The fact that when a thank you, your welcome, or please is forgotten
Receipts, cardboard boxes, rocks, stones, and candy wrappers are hoarded or
A K isn’t connected properly and scissor skills aren’t ready for first grade
You’re all too aware that
They could
At any time
Say
But you’re home all day

Birthdays Mean Bigger Numbers

Numbers just get bigger
Yesterday four
Today five
A year ago yesterday I could still answer the question
How old is she
By saying three and
And it wasn’t so long ago that I answered in months rather than years
I suppose I still could
If my last math class wasn’t in high school
But it was
Twenty years ago
I wonder if as the numbers get bigger
I’ll be asked the question less often
I wonder if that will make me sad
As so many numbers get bigger
At the same time
The answer for him will soon be three
The answer for me
Is also bigger than it used to be
None of them can start over from zero and
When you do
All over again
The numbers just keep getting bigger

Tofurkey and Bin Laden

Tofurkey and Bin Laden
This is what I have visited upon my children
By bringing them into the world
What I have given them
GPS and Asthma
A piano in a house with asbestos tiles
Long walks and obscene amounts of toys
At least it wasn’t
A Commodore Vic 20 and a Members Only Jacket
Or the Jackson Five and butterfly collars
Besides you can get Tofurkey for free from ShopRite
If you spend enough money on groceries and
It comes with a vegan chocolate cake
What else is there to say
But to give thanks to God or
Allah or
Whomever

Staying in touch with the Earth

When I garden
I don’t wear gloves
I like to feel the dirt in my fingers
I need to connect with it
I even spread my mulch by hand
If I can skip using a tool
I do
I can’t help but think that
The more I stay in touch
The longer I can stay away

Fear Bites

This morning
At the orchard
After marauding geese had forced her into my arms
She bit me and
I was reminded of how I respond to stress when I’m at home
With one trip to the kitchen
After the other
Filling my mouth with whatever I can get my hands on
Toast
Fruit
Candy
And
In a pinch
Even the collar of my shirt
If I was surrounded by hungry geese
Small enough to be picked up and
Didn’t have Goldfish crackers or a granola bar
I suppose I would bite too

Parental Possibilities

Life with kids is like
Running on a treadmill
That is going just a bit too fast
You pant
Tongue hanging out
Looking less like Michael Jordan and
More like an unwashed St. Bernard
Your gait is long and
Anything but
Fluid
Your hands are too high
Making you look like you’re running in waist deep water but
You’re too worried that you will go flying off and
Crack your head open but
You don’t
You never end up in a heap on the floor
Having collected a few innocent stragglers
In your vivid flameout
You never do but
Life as a parent is all about
Possibilities

Brought to you by the letter Y

Yakety yak don’t talk back
Yelled the yam at the
Yo-yo
Yogurt dripping down his chin
Yum or
Yuck
You must decide
Yes or
Yellow
You know which
Yesterday or
Youth
Your choice
Yawn
Yachts on the
Yazoo river


By: seren and daddy

My father's shoes

My father’s shoes are usually empty
But occasionally I do put them on for a walk
As I did this week
Killing ants with my bare hands
Squishing them one at a time
Just like my father did
The squishing part that is
The ants in Pennsylvania are actually quite a bit smaller and
Crunch a lot less than the Michigan ants did
The ones I used to have to flush down the toilet
One at a time
Using a roll of toilet paper in the process and
The two jobs I had
Weren’t really both full time and
I didn’t work weekends even when I was supposed to and
It turns out he’s actually a size 14
While
Regardless of what I say
I’m still size 13 but
Regardless of what I say or
Occasionally think
It really is fine
My feet are a little too big for the twisty slide or
The balance beam
As it is and
I like wearing my keens
Without socks
You really shouldn’t wear other people’s shoes without socks

We need a Nelson Mandela

America needs its own Nelson Mandela
Someone we can sing songs about
Someone in whose name we
The people
Can take to the streets
And take matters into our own hands
I'd do it
But I'm not a forty year in prison kind of guy
And I'm already nearly forty years old
Besides
For the prison time to be worthwhile
You have to be able to convince folks
That they are suffering
Under a sort of class focused apartheid
A caste system
If you will
A social order
Put in place and enforced by both custom and law
And I can't convince my wife
That family story is a good idea
And just as a two year old doesn’t listen every night
Every one isn’t perpetually untouchable
And everyone doesn’t see me as my wife does
And Nelson Mandela wasn’t a poet so
I’m not the Nelson Mandela that America needs
But maybe if he or she does emerge
I can convince my wife to let me
Write poetry about it

Lost and Found

I wish I felt lost
Lost is romantic
Lost is hopeful
Afterall
If you're lost
You might be found
To be interesting
Succesful
Funny
Inspiring
Memorable
Maybe even historic
But
Once you've been found
You are
Whatever you've been found to be
Increasingly these days
I'm feeling sore
Sick
Old and
Found

Four ... teen

She screams and
Flails
She always flails but
She doesn’t always
Clench her teeth and
Yell
About how she would rather live
Somewhere else
With someone else
That’s reserved for when I take away
A stuffed animal or doll but
Not just any
Stuffed animal or doll
The foreshadowing of teen angst is
Reserved only for
The inner circle
Pink Baa-Baa
Rosie
Sarah and
Juice
Juice is
The poodle that she insists is a cat
Whose journey
Through the air and
Down the stairs
Caused the anguished comments today and
Who
Through a promised return
Helped to broker a peace settlement
Juice’s other role is to remind me that
Even while she is
Screaming
Telling me how bad I am and
Angrily scribbling on her craft table
She is almost five
Not fifteen
The flailing is another clue

Spring in Pennsylvania

Rain coats and umbrellas on Monday
Winter coats on Tuesday
T-shirts and Sandals on Wednesday
Slacks and spring jackets on Thursday
Rain gear
Again
On Friday
This weekend
While I sit inside
I will start planning a move to
Boring
San Diego
Where I won’t even need to own a winter jacket
And I’ll seldom have to wear
Or even say
Slacks

Candy Cigarettes

I don’t smoke
So candy cigarettes
If I could even find them
Probably weren’t going to work
She already has her own shovel and rake and
Hose nozzle and
There is plenty of as yet un-beautified land out back
So If I had a perennial to find a place for
She could do her own gardening
She has her own laptops
Fisher Price and Dell to be precise
Both outdated
So if I were in my office working on my own outdated computer
We’d both be able to grade papers
She has her own pans but
She doesn’t use them to prepare her own meals when I cook
Why would she
When I clearly have enough to share and
I have whisks and colanders and griddles and woks too
It’s not time to cook though and
It’s April 14th
So she had to have her own 1040 and
2441
Child and Dependent Car Expenses and
A black pen
Ink or
Preferably colored black on the outside
Either way
It’s probably a good think I don’t drink coffee or
Smoke

Little Hands

He has small hands but
Quite a reach
That’s my conclusion for the evening
I want to be profound
To sum up human existence but
In my quest to do so
The part I am summing up
Becomes smaller and smaller
The more profound I become
The less I am being profound about
It is a continuous retreat
Away from philosophy and
History to
Today
In the Western Hemisphere
The Eastern Seaboard
Levittown
My son’s room
My son
At eight at night
I’m trying to conjure verses in my head
While singing Springsteen and
He’s rubbing my back
Hugging me
Shoving his hands back between us and
Then back to hugging
His little hands slipping easily in and out of the space between us
Then hitting one small spot on my back and
Spreading out
Everywhere
Clearing my mind of everything but
His hands
Is that small or
Is it big

Parental Priorities

Laundry is only so important
It does have to be done and
On occasion
I have felt hugged by my favorite sweatshirt and
Felt an emotion akin to love regarding my favorite underwear
Hell
It can even keep me too close
Hug me a little too much and
Be difficult to say goodbye to
However
I have yet to find a two pack of little blue eyed boys or
Name brand skinny girls with curly hair
At a discount at Marshalls

Love Too

“Love too”
It wasn’t unprompted and
When I fished for a repeat
I received a “no” and a
“Me not” but
It doesn’t matter because
He can’t have it back

Life is four rocks and a tape measure

Start with four rocks and a tape measure and
A half hour before bath time
Almost a week later
In another stolen moment
Add in
A drainage pipe
Eight more rocks and
Substitute a size thirteen shoe
For the tape measure I don’t feel like getting out of the garage and
What you have is
Not anywhere close to a sandbox and
Two raised garden beds but
Is a perfect analogy for life

The Sounds of Spring

The first warm day of the year
Is the loudest
By August I’ll have my moves down and
My strategy in place
They’ll only be alone together near an open window
At certain times
The air conditioners will be in and on and
My move to the front door from the eating position
Will be a polished work of athletic prowess
For now
One way or the other
I’ll just have to sweat it out

Smothered in Red, White, and Blue

Is it the flag on your porch or
The troops in Iraq and Afghanistan
That keep you from seeing
Is it Phillipians 4:13
In a curly maple frame
Hanging in the front hallway
Is it the gun you keep under your pillow
Is it the Constitution or
The Fourth of July
Is it Ferrari or Lamborghini
Is it visions of little brown and black people
With swollen bellies living in
Houses made of corrugated metal
Is it John Wayne
Hank Williams and
Tom Monaghan
Is it being able to press 0 for Spanish
Is it the color of our President’s skin or
Do you figure that you are as comfortable
Smothered in red white and blue
As you can ever hope to be

Freedom isn't free

A man alone in the middle of the Ocean
Clinging to a piece of flotsam
Is terribly restricted
But when he loses his grip
He is free

Noth Poe

I wish I could always be headed for the North Pole
Like my son is

Whenever we set up the train
(Two chairs, a bed rail,
A microphone, and a wooden train whistle)
The destination is always the same
The North Pole or
The Noth Poe
We never go directly there though
We always stop in Chicago first
All trains stop in Chicago and
We always head into the laundry rooms and
Up the elevator to the top of the Sears Tower
Where we push the button and
Wait for the dryer to beep and
Let us know it’s time to go to the bathroom
Where the observation deck is
Then
Quickly
It’s back into the laundry room and
Down to the taxi
I’ve never seen a futon move this fast and
It’s a good thing because we’re always running late
For real and
For the train to the Noth Poe but
We always make it
We always have a good time
We always do a little karaoke

I wish I could believe that every trip would be like this
I wish I too could always be headed for the Noth Poe

Be my shadow

This morning when I cut coupons
I wasn’t alone
Her scissors were smaller and
Her choice of coupons different
Her definition of coupons was even different but
She was one chair over from me
At the dining room table and
I’d cut out the Sponge Bob Square Pants checks
Call them coupons and
Cut them out with safety scissors too
If I were four
In fact I ‘m tempted now
Really more tempted than I am to cut out shampoo coupons but
She did that too
She opened the new can of paint
Helped mulch a garden bed and plant some lilies
Helped convince her brother to come to lunch and
At dinner time
She pulled out her pots and pans and
Plastic fruits and vegetables and
Potato chips and
Cooked up a stew
Right alongside
Underneath and
Underfoot
Making sure
At least for this evening
That I wasn’t alone

Of Pipes and Pyramids

The pyramids were built
One stone at a time and
Regardless of how they did it
It was hard work that had to be done by someone
Egyptologists swear that they were tradesman but
Even if they were slaves
They were still people
Many persons
Individuals
One of which
Probably paused after a huge block was
Put into its final place
Where it still rests today
Four thousand years later and
Glanced over at the Nile River and
Maybe there was a slight breeze
With a grey heron gliding across a sunset and
Maybe he thought about a good day’s work and
His family waiting at home for him and
Maybe he felt as I do
When
Through the monitor
I can hear his little voice
“Oh Daddy Boy pipes, pipes
Pipes pipes”
Maybe he was smiling

Feverish

In twenty years
I might try hugging a heating pad
With one slightly damp corner
Leaning against my shoulder
And a bag of sand or two
Attached to it with duct tape
All that would be missing would be the occasional moan and
The possibility
That
When given the option of going outside for some fresh air
The heating pad
While running a hundred and one degree temperature
Would ask to pull his sister in a wagon

Freedom

Tonight
My son
With his feet firmly on the ground
Leaned over forward
Until his head also touched the ground and
Being completely naked
Was able to reach around
Back between his legs
To pull on his penis
All the while chanting about
Poop

When you're in the middle of it ...

Sometimes everyone cries at once and
When that happens
I feel like
An ER doc
When all the ambulances arrive at the same time
It’s a moment of fear
A moment of worry
Empathy
Something could be wrong
Perhaps even irrevocably wrong
One never knows but
I can’t help but smile
Somewhere
Deep
Inside
Just as the ER Doc must
When those ambulances role in
It’s what he was trained to do
It’s his job

Spring?

Daffodills broke through
Forsythias broken out;
Low of thirty five

Time Out, I'm Two

A two year old
Taking some time to calm down
In the corner
Voluntarily
Is either like a
Freshly made bed
With a mint on the pillow and
A fluffy white bath robe hanging on the door
When you’re at home or
Perennials
Planted last year
Poking their heads up through the dirt
This year
Or
It’s something else entirely
Something you see late at night
On a lonely and
Dimly lit
Street corner
That makes you go home and
Lock all the doors

Diapers are full of ...

Diapers
They might be the final frontier
For man and
Surely sometimes I feel like I am in outer space or
Speaking an alien language or
Doing something as unheard of as walking on the moon and
Sometimes I am treated as if I am doing something
Unheard of
Something that must be being filmed in a Hollywood back
Something that should be on television and
Not in their lives or
In their family
To me
It’s always just a diaper or
A play group or
Groceries or
A consignment sale or
A sprint around the room with jeans on my head yelling “poop”
After every word a two year old could possible know and
Sometimes
I think shit
Is shit

Daddy, Mommy is on line one

I wonder if it ever gets old
Obama must have heard it a million times by now
Mr. President
I need to speak with you
Mr. President
The Prime Minister of England is on line one
Mr. President
We have a situation
Mr. President
Bo had an accident in the Oval Office
I’m betting that it doesn’t but
The only title of importance I’ve ever held is
Daddy and
While my heart still races a bit
Every time one of my kids uses it and
At least once a day
It still leaves me completely awe struck
I don’t know if
The heart flutter and
The irrepressible smile
Translates to
Less important titles

Imagining at 37

My children can look at two
Monogrammed Pottery Barn Kids Anywhere Chairs
One dark blue
One light blue
Facing each other
In front of a book case
With a toddler bed rail
Blocking access in or out and
Imagine a train
I need the wooden train whistle and
The microphone from the karaoke setup
To keep up but
I’m not two or four anymore

Two

He’s two
So when I ask him if he wants a hug he says yes and
Sometimes he even looks at me
Afterwards
Asking
With his eyes and
His smile
For another
I never turn him down and
I hug him until the exact moment he indicates
He’s done
Every single time
He won’t be two forever

Signs of the Apocalypse

Is it just paint in my hair or
Is it foreshadowing
Is weathered glass a hair color
Would I want it if it was
There would be poetry in a
Change from red to blue hair
But not everything poetic is good
Maybe hair is a prose thing
A phenomenon best explained
Without alliteration or
Metaphor or
Hidden meaning
I was born with red hair
My hair gradually grew less red
Although even now it still isn’t brown
Especially in the summer and
My beard
My arm hair and
All the rest is still clearly red
So far the only gray is really blue/green and
It was painted on
Along with the bathroom walls but
Now I can’t lift my arm easily to my face
To deal with that white hair poking out of my beard
That’s not just paint
Is it

Emily Dickinson and Fukushima Daiichi

Emily Dickinson was haunted by the ‘deepening menace’ of death
Many of those close to her died and
She lived across from a cemetery and
She was human like the rest of us and
Smarter than most of us
So she knew what awaited and
Could imagine what didn’t and
It troubled her
She knew well that
Sometimes the truths’ surprise isn’t superb
Or surprising
Like when
It rides in on a wave and
Vents out of a damaged nuclear reactor and
Falls down on those who would stand up to oppression
But especially when
It comes at us in the form of tombstones
Funerals
Headaches
New pains
Old friends
Oil covered birds washed up on beautiful beaches
Documentaries about euthanasia
Births in the front seat of cars and
Begonias in the winter
It’s dazzling and
Haunting and
Blinds us all eventually
Even if we never really look
At the menace all round us and
In us

I've started drinking tea

I've started drinking tea
Coffee is still a step too far
I wear a compression stocking now and
Weed of my own volition and
Mulch and
Plant trees
My Grandfather planted trees and
I thought he was silly but
I cut coupons now and
I even know when it is time to cut off an activity
So that we can eat or
Bathe or
Go to bed or
So that I can mete out discipline
I have a serious voice now
So I can do the discipline thing
I even like to lie still for a moment or two and
Worry about credit card balances and leaky roofs
I know the end is probably upon me but
I’m not getting out the white sneakers and
Wearing them with everything
Just yet
So you can keep the lattes and mochas and whatever
I don’t even want coffee ice cream
It’s still just a little too much
A little too far

brief, deciduous, ephemeral, evanescent, flash, fleeting, fugacious, fugitive, impermanent, passing, short-lived, temporary, transient, momentary

Her blue beach umbrella goes tumbling across the beach and
Into the ocean
I could have been right behind it but
I hesitated
I looked at my compression stocking
I heard my screaming children
I retreated
I regrouped
It collapsed
Glimmered for a moment
A spot of brighter blue and then
Disappeared into the waves

Spring Evening

In a corner of our
Not so expansive
Yard
In Levittown
The kids are celebrating the coming of spring
Again
This is the third or fourth time so far but
The first time that they haven’t needed winter coats and
Mittens
They don’t collapse into fits of wheezing and coughing when they run
They can’t even see their breath
Underneath the umbrellas
Attached to their red and blue beach chairs
So I think whatever they're doing must be working
Maybe we should let them stay a little longer and
Bring out their babies to lie out underneath the Dora umbrella
Maybe we should but
As much as I would love the warmer weather to arrive for good
I need more time to prepare the garden beds and
Spring isn’t the only thing that is coming
To Levittown
At seven at on a week night
Coming too quickly
As it always does
Nighttime isn’t as patient with day
As spring is with winter
The only thing that lingers longer than winter
Is a kid
Outside
In weather over forty degrees
At bedtime
In our suddenly plenty big enough
Yard
In Levittown

Spring Emerges

Purple yellow blue
Poking through sporadic mulch;
My feet in sandals

The end.

It will all run out someday
Meltdown
Seep away
Explode into a supernova or
Be washed away in a river of unnamed carcinogens and
However it happens
Someone will pull the plug
Whether supernatural or not or
Intentionally or not and
Someone
Not at all supernatural
Will be there to know the end has come and
Will have the chance
To feel as if
Anything is possible

I know that

I know that
I may not always walk down the paths or
End up in the places
I would or
Should
Have chosen
Especially now but
I know that
Someday I’ll dream of little hands and
They’ll be gone and
I know that
Now they’re everywhere and
On everything and
Each time he takes my hand in his
I know that
I am exactly where I want to be

Tagger Gun

Tagger gun
Staple gun
What do you say
Take out the trash or
Fly away



By Seren

Bamboo Dreams

White polyethylene cutting boards
Extend in every direction
And not a one of them is new
They all bear the marks
Of use
Who knows how many chicken breasts
Strawberries
Loaves of foccacia bread
Have passed this way
But now
They are gone
And I am alone
Forced to look for something random in the knife marks
And find nothing
Except one pattern after the other

True Sacrifice Isn't

I’ve never thrown myself in front of a bus
So that someone else might avoid that gruesome fate
I’ve never charged across a mountain pass
Exposed to enemy fire
In order to rescue seven of my buddies
My mom didn’t either and
She never received the key to the city
Any city and
I haven’t seen my mother accessorizing with
A purple heart or
The Congressional Medal of Honor
So
She doesn’t have one and
I would have been the first to say she didn’t deserve one but
A funny thing happened
I started waking up to something other than an alarm
Something more organic and more persistent
Humming or
More frequently now
Singing or
Chanting
Sometimes screaming and
I can hear it
Even when no one else can
I can hear it and
I respond
Not out of fear or
Adrenaline or
Instinct
I’m a runner
I have no instinct and
Adrenaline doesn’t keep you going for eighteen or
Twenty or
How old am I?
I choose to respond
In the cold and harsh light or
Darkness
Of morning
I choose to respond
Just as my mother and father chose to respond
Not for a medal
Though I would take one
I choose to respond because when I drag myself out of bed and
Up the stairs
Waiting for me
On the other side of a door
I have to open
Quietly
Deliberately
Is a two year old boy
In urine soaked pajamas
Who wants to hug me
It might not accessorize well
But
Even if I had to walk the better part of a day
Just to find a bus
To throw myself in front of
For it
I would

To Do List

Get the kids dressed
Pack the backpack for school
Pack snacks in the diaper bag
Scoop cat litter
Set up roofer estimates
Put shower doors on curb before trash day
Break up branches that have been sitting on the porch since last year
Put a coat of primer on the walls in the bathroom
Pick up rooms
Make dinner
Take out diapers
Lay out the kids clothes for the next day
Tidy up
Teach my course
Check my e-mail
And
When
I
Check
My
List
At
The
End
Of
The
Day
Remember
That
The
Most
Important
Things
Usually
Don’t
Make
It
Onto
A
list

Parenthood is ...

brain freeze.

Snapshot Sexuality

As if Parents didn’t have enough sleepless nights already
Now we have to worry about how we are recording
Our children’s
Childhood
Even more than we did before
Now people are looking back to snapshots to confirm their sexuality
Snapshots
Of little kids
Sometimes four
Three
Two or
Younger
Apparently show that homosexuality is genetic and
That there is no such thing as
Dress casual
Hands on your hips
You’re gay
In a spacesuit or
Have frumpy hair
You’re a lesbian
Your parents put you in a yellow clingy onesie
You’re justified in having anal sex
I’d laugh
If I didn’t have to think more carefully
About whether
I should be capturing my son wearing a tiara or
My daughter wielding a sword
It may influence the direction of their lives
It may just make them sleep more soundly at night
Which
Any parent can tell you
Is no small matter

Parenthood is ...

an antique that you are too nervous to take into the Antique Roadshow.

From fingernails to eggs

You can add the sound of the cracking of pretend eggs
To fingernails on the chalkboard
At least in my book
At least in my life
Where every evening three of us cook in the kitchen
All of us using my pots and pans and whisks
And only one of us not using wooden eggs and
Milk cartons and
Producing the lowest calorie food possible
On the floor
Of my kitchen
Of my life
Where the wooden eggs
React quite angrily to being
Subjected to the pantomime
Of cracking
Sounding like a baby chicken caught in a teapot and
Being quite inconsolable and
Quite real
At least to my ears
Which don’t even hear as well as they used to
When I sat in a classroom with a chalk board and
Feared something more than wooden eggs
At five in the afternoon
On my kitchen floor

Parenthood is ...

all about the art of benign and even good intentioned obfuscation.

Every Day

Between
Falling asleep
And
Falling awake
I try my best to stay upright

Parenthood is ...

the balancing of guilt and joy.

Parenthood is ...

being caught between a to do list and not wanting to be done.

Parenthood is ...

a pantomime being staged at the junction between dream and reality.

Kindergarten

Kindergarten is not reached by crossing the river Styx
Or even a room filled with Styx music
But from here
Only a few months away from that first day and
With registration now behind us
It kind of seems like it
On this side is a little girl
Who still wants to marry her brother and
Live with us forever
Who still runs and jumps in our arms and
Wants us to cuddle and sing her to sleep
On the other side is something different
Something scary
But what can we do
But the only thing we want to do
Keep on loving her

Parenthood is ...

an opportunity for your lacrimal glands to get frequent exercise.

Tongue with butter

I threaten to eat his tongue
And make the faces that I imagine Snidely Whiplash might make
If he was interested in eating Dudley Do-Rights tongue
He smiles
A completely non-sinister smile
Throws his hands over his face
Giggles
And says “hide”
Then we touch foreheads
And both laugh
And he says “more”
Just as he does when I turn the television off
Now it works

Parenthood is ...

work in a minefield deciding which mines should be defused and which simply taken note of and avoided.

Unfinished Projects

Life is like a home repair job
Seemingly always over budget and
Unfinished and
Never quite able to fulfill your expectations
On the bright side
There will always people to blame and
One of them will always be you

Parenthood is ...

the opposite of a long walk in the woods at dusk.

Boogers For Dinner

Tonight we had boogers for dinner
She told me she can’t say it any other way
So we were having boogers
Not burgers and
Certainly not berbers
She told her brother that he couldn’t say berbers
She told him again and again
Until he was screaming and crying and
I wanted to
Because we absolutely weren’t eating berbers

Parenthood is ...

... like being King George ... any of them.

Parenthood is ...

One of the longest running shows, on or off broadway … playing at a mall, a supermarket, a playground, or a theatre near you.

Neurotic Photo

I’m a bit neurotic
But even I don’t give much thought to posterity
When I write most things
Even when I’m writing on
Something that might actually stick around a while
Like
A yearbook
A guest book at a wedding or
The back of a picture
So
I too might have written
“This is a picture I had taken 2 years ago
As you can see
I am no longer slim”
I might even have underlined slim
As my Granddad did
Though
I wouldn’t have included a cigar in the picture
Jutting out of my mouth Churchill style and
I wouldn’t have handed out a picture
With said cigar or
With me reading a book
But cigars and books are passé
I probably wouldn’t have had the picture taken at all
I don’t even want professional photos taken of my kids
Who are far cuter than me or my Grandad
Why would I
I have the internet and a digital camera and
I can write and rewrite captions on digital photos
Which
I would do
If I was motivated to communicate in that way
But as you can see
I am no longer so motivated and
Am as neurotic as ever

Parenthood is ...

... log rolling with a fifty pound pack.

What is Parenthood? ... Parenthood is a cacophony of love

Lawrence Ferlinghetti has a book called "What is Poetry?" On the back of the book it is described as an "ongoing project which he is constantly revising and expanding." This project consists of a collection of very short poetic descriptions of poetry. Again referring to the back of the book, "[h]aving an aversion to the idea of discussing the 'craft' of poetry or the 'process' of creating a poem, Lawrence Ferlinghetti usually mumbles something about 'It's a trade secret' when pressed on the subject. 'What is Poetry?' is the closest he has come to formulating an ars poetica."

Here are a couple of examples:

Poetry is the anarchy of the senses
making sense

Poetry is news
from the frontiers
of consciousness

I don't have a problem discussing parenthood, or poetry for that matter, but I like the idea of coming up with my own version of "What is Poetry?" for parenthood ... my own attempt at an ars parentem ... so I'm going to give it a try. My thought is to post one of these one or two liners every day, we'll see if it actually happens. What will happen is the first ...






Poetry is a cacophony of love

Water Damage

Bad stuff lurks beneath the surface
In places you can’t go
Can’t see and
Wouldn’t understand if you could and
Just about everywhere
If you think about it
Is someplace you can’t go or see
The inside of your own body
The inside of you child’s mind
The inside of a wall
She might scream about the density of chicken nuggets and
Hit her brother because he wanted her to identify a color and
There might be cracking paint up and down a wall and
You might have chest pains when you eat tomatoes or pineapple
But that’s what you know
It’s all you know
There’s no crawling in her ear and
I probably know less about walls than I do about child psychology
I do know
However
That the shark’s fin isn’t the real problem

Windy Day

Branches sing and dance
Within the wind’s rough embrace;
Naked and exposed



By: Daddy (with Seren's help)

The End of February

Rain in the forecast
Patches of snow on the ground;
The space in between

Hasheem Thabeet for Governor of Wisconsin

Hasheem Thabeet
It’s what I have started saying say when I tickle my son
He thinks it’s hilarious
But he laughs hysterically when I rinse with mouthwash
So I could probably say Kirk Hinrich or
Jeff Green and
As long as I played it up a little
Get the same reaction but
I enjoy saying
Hasheem Thabeet and
Neither of us care that he’s been traded
From Memphis
To Houston
As long as he doesn’t go back to the Dakota Wizards
I’ll keep saying it
Maybe it’ll be our pretend alternative name
I have always used Obama with my daughter
Whose pajamas are these?
I think they are Obama’s
Who is my favorite daughter?
Is it Obama?
Someone’s calling
Who is it?
Obama!
Who is going to get some candy?
Obama!!!
I think Hasheem Thabeet will be a lot more fun
Besides
He really was born in another country and
He is a Muslim
He really is a basketball player and
For now
Not just in the D-League
If he’s a fascist or
A socialist or
A Communist or
All three
Then it will be beyond perfect and
We will both be laughing
When I say it
Actually
We’ll both laugh as it is
The only problems is that
I actually like the name and
Feel a little bad about using
Hasheem Thabeet
In this way
So maybe we’ll go with
Scott Walker
He can’t play basketball and
He isn’t even rumored to be a Muslim but
He has the best chance of being a fascist and
I don’t feel bad about using his name
He’ll never be in the same league
Even if it is the D-League
As
Hasheem Thabeet

Seren's Summer Poem

It’s still winter
It’s still cold
There is snow on the ground
But
Summer’s coming
After Spring and
I want summer to come
Because it’s warm and has
Playgrounds that aren’t covered with snow and
Pools and
Sesame Place and
Shorts and
T-shirts and
Sandals and
Flip flops and
Ice pops and
Longer days
It’s still winter now
But
Summer is coming and
I can’t wait to play

By Seren and Daddy

Daddy

A week or so ago
I started hearing daddy
Now I’m daddy
I was dada
But dad’s gone
I don’t know how long daddy will last
Maybe longer than dada
But probably not forever
Although it was only a few years ago
I heard my father in law call his wife mommy
So anything is possible
But before the teenage years hit
I’ll probably be dad
And although there may be an asshole interlude
I’ll probably remain dad
No child of mine will be calling anyone father and
It’s hard to imagine me being a papa
So I’ll be dad
I don’t need to be dad now
I’m not yearning for it
Or needing it
It’ll come and
It’ll be around a long time
On the other hand
Daddy won’t
And I’ll probably never be dada again
So I’m daddy now
And I’m going to try to hear that as often as possible

Daffodil Delayed

The snow has returned
Covering everything up
Even the daffodils
And the tulips
Leaving them in a purgatory of sorts
Between dirt and sky
Sometime denizens of both
Truly destined for neither
But certainly on a journey
That hopefully
Has only been delayed

Parenting is like ...

I’ve never sailed
At night
In the Gulf of Aiden
During a storm
Blindfolded
But I do have a four year old daughter and
A two year old son
So
I’m sure the storm is on the horizon
I wonder what color of blindfold I should request

America's Last Supper

To me
It feels like
We’re trapped in a diner and
The blob is outside and
Slowly oozing in
Except we haven’t just run in with Jane’s brother
After he shot at the blob with a cap gun
We haven’t been trying to convince the town that it exists
We haven’t even noticed that the doctor and
The mechanic and
The janitor in Mr. Andrew's grocery store
Are missing
Eaten up
We’re just sitting in our booths
Eating an omelet or
A club sandwich
With a frilly toothpick stuck in the middle and
Sipping on a milkshake
Probably vanilla
We’re not going to discover that the thing hates cold
We won’t use the fire extinguishers on it
It won’t get flown to the North Pole
To wait for a sequel
We’re just going to be consumed
Sitting in our booths
Talking about the weather
Arguing about the bills
We’re trapped in a diner
Eating our last supper or
Lunch and
We may never know it

Linda Cohn and Happiness

I didn’t watch the Super Bowl in a bar with the boys
I watched it with my kids and
My wife and
Someone else’s kids and
His wife and
Him and
I didn’t miss the
Multiple big screens or
The beers or
The Eagle jerseys and
I think that’s because
If I didn’t have a wife and kids
I would choose Linda Cohn
Over anyone in the recent SI Swimsuit Issue
Which I probably won’t read
For about the twentieth year in a row
In fact
I think that if most of us were offered our choice
We’d choose Linda Cohn and
It wouldn’t matter if it was for a one night stand or
Until death do we part
She’s Linda Cohn for God sakes
She was on the boy’s ice hockey team
She knows sports
She’s on ESPN
She’s funny
She’s fun
If you’re a happily married dad
She’s the equivalent of
A big screen television in a friend’s basement
With toddler’s running in and out of the room
She’s the official sportscaster for
Dad’s who enjoy watching the Super Bowl with their families

winter hike ... or what it's like to be dragged along a nature trail

Hanging from my hand
Slipping on frozen footsteps;
My son’s winter hike

Monday

Monday
Daughter awake and chatting
Singing
Screaming for mommy
Screaming
Singing
Talking
At us
Right through the monitor
At 5:30 in the morning
Son awake and chatting
Happily
Rattling his crib
Talking to his stuffed turtle
Humming a combination of
Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and
Jingle Bells
All indirectly for our benefit
Delivered to us through the monitor
At 10:00 at night
In between
Laundry day
Grading day
She’s early to work
I’m out of acid reflux medicine
We’re out of cat litter
Out of patience
Out of time
It’s definitely
Monday

My mother's love

It was love
Before I knew or
Worried about what love was
It still is

I want a Gatorade bath

Moms and Dads are like coaches
In that they shoulder a lot of blame
When things go wrong
They don’t, however, get to look like geniuses
When things go right
The things get more credit
There isn’t even a Gatorade bath
But there should be
Of course the good ones aren’t looking for credit
They are happy with a hug
They’d like a nap
They’d love to be able to slow time down
At least once in a while
With the probable exception of the hug
Those are the same traits a good coach has
But he or she gets a whistle and
Gets to wear a hoodie
Most of the time
Which helps to make up for the heavy burden
Personally
I’d settle for just one Gatorade bath
Even if my wife had to give it to me.

Midnight Reunion

Under the covers
Motionless in a dark room;
I slip under too

Valentines Basics

Back in the day
Real sports cars didn’t have
Fancy stereos or
Seat warmers or
Ashtrays
Nothing extra
Because it wasn’t about
A warm ass or
A convenient smoke
It was about
The car and
The driver
Being together
Enjoying doing
What cars and drivers were meant to do
Our Valentine’s Day won’t be about
Diamonds
Sapphires
Dozens and dozens of roses
Fancy expensive meals out
Weekend escapes or
Surprise serenades
We will have
Homemade valentines
Take out
Eaten at 9:00
If we’re lucky and
Maybe
If a coupon lines up with a sale
Candy
We’ll also
Have and
Want to have
Each other

Beethoven and Me

Beethoven directed the first performance of the ninth symphony or
At least he was on stage at the same time as
Someone else
Who thought he was directing
History isn’t clear as to the truth but
What matters is that Beethoven
Bravely ignored the disconnect between mind and body
He was deaf
Completely deaf
But he didn’t let it stop him
I know why
I designed a cave for my children
Out of bed sheets
A train table
An ironing board
A futon
My daughter’s piggy bank and
Other assorted possessions and
Repossessions and
It was a huge hit and
I conducted its premier
From inside for
There was no where else to be at that moment and
I was blissfully unaware of my age
My hip
My shoulder
My leg with the surface wound that could
Explode at any time and
Has
Not to mention
The new injuries I acquired
Trying to keep up with
A Two year old and
A four year old but
It didn’t matter because
I could see that
I was conducting a masterpiece

Life as subtraction

The Azalea
Still half hidden, branches bent;
A lingering chill

Morning Mourning

A funeral can be a party
A wedding can be a wake
The elements are always there
To make whatever out of whatever
Parenting is no different
A parent could wear black
All the time
Every morning
Because the child that goes to bed
Is never the one that wakes up
Yesterday’s child is gone
Never to return
Of course the person wearing black
Every day of their life with young children
Is the football fan
Who is already worried about salary cap limitations or
The potential impact of a work stoppage
The morning after a Super Bowl victory
The sun doesn’t stay set
It doesn’t stay risen either
Which is a damn good thing since
I like sunsets and
Sunrises and wearing black
I even like to acknowledge
Things are changing
It helps me to remember
Everything
They used to be and
What they are right now

A child's hope for winter

No shadow this year;
Irregular mounds of snow
still hide a carrot

Monkeying around with discipline

Currently
Giving her a
Time out
Means
She clings to me
Like a howler monkey
To a branch loaded with ripe figs
In an attempt to avoid being left there alone
She sounds the part too
I can’t imagine a monkey is easily pried from her figs
But in the wild lots of different monkey species
Share a fig tree
So they have to leave the figs behind
Which means I have to
Keep peeling her off
Shaking her off
Pulling my foot out from
The full body hug she gives it for
Someday soon
She might have to share
Hopefully her brother is one of the quieter species

Waiting For Love

You came out of the house
Met me in the driveway
House dress flapping around on your skinny legs

You hugged me

You didn’t look like my Grandmother
Didn’t act like my Grandmother
Certainly bore no resemblance to my mother’s mother

I think of that moment
Nearly every time I think of you

You have become that sunny day in the driveway
Nonetheless
I’ve opted not to wait
Until I have a grandchild

Obama waits for the Lord, maybe my kids can too

My son wakes up laughing
My daughter wakes up screaming
Obama wakes up and
Waits
On the Lord
When he wakes in the morning and
When he goes to sleep at might
He waits on the Lord
My kids need to find the Lord
If the Lord can make a busy man like the President
Then maybe he can do something
With a two year old boy and
A four year old girl
Because as of now
They wait for no woman
Or man

Mubarak and Parenting

I feel for Mubarak
In a way that I never would have felt
For a dictator
Before I had children
I haven’t yet sent one of my children
Undercover
To stone the other
But I understand
What the burden of
Responsibility
Can force you to do
I’ve forced my son kicking and screaming into his car seat
I’ve lied to my daughter and
Eaten her candy and
I’ve resigned
Myself
To quite a bit
I feel for Mubarak as
A young day laborer
Feels for an old time NFL player
Who hobbles around on a cane and
Is addicted to pain medication
I’m frighteningly familiar with his pain

Rationalization

The day will come
Soon
When I won’t be able to carry both of my children
Down the stairs
At the same time
And that will be fine
Because they are pretty cute
Going up and down those stairs and
I won’t miss the back pain
Besides
Maybe we’ll move into a ranch house

A poem a day

A poem a day keeps the doctor away
Unless you have to stay up to midnight writing one
Or two
Or three
Because you stubbornly want to write one for every day in the month
This month
This month that is almost over
In which case
You should stick with an apple

Imaginary Snow Days

Elephants and Monsters
Snoozy, Strawberry, and Sweetie;
Snowed out of School too

Her love is better than chocolate, but what about rhubarb pie?

In her song Ice Cream
Sarah McLachlan asserted that
Love could be better than ice cream or
Chocolate
Despite the fact that this was the song
To which I danced my first dance with my wife
As my wife
I never really gave much thought to the statement
I don’t really like chocolate and
‘Better than ice cream’
Is just too vague for me
What kind of ice cream?
What is on the ice cream?
What time of year is it?
Besides, I wanted to dance to Van Morrison’s Crazy Love
So I have never taken Sarah’s claim very seriously
Until recently
Until my daughter started saying
I love you
Twice
At night
It used to be that she said I love you
After I said I love you
After she blew me a kiss and
After I blew her seven kisses
But with the new year
She began to add something new in
Before she says
‘Good night sleep tight good night’
She added another ‘I love you’
An unprompted ‘I love you’
An unprompted ‘I love you’ followed by a ‘daddy’
That is better than Chocolate
That is better than ice cream
In most every scenario I can come up with
That may even be better than Strawberry-Rhubarb Pie
Or my homemade Molasses cookies
That is a crazy love
And it is better than anything else I have tried
Or at least
It has the potential
To be
Every bit as good

Snow Storm

Garbage can balanced
Four feet above the driveway;
Snow is still falling

Blizzards and Saddam: Passing fancies

This morning
With the power out
And the world covered in a foot
Or more
Of heavy wet snow
I couldn’t get Saddam’s blood Quran out of my head
A Quran
Written entirely in human blood
It must be beautiful
It would almost have to be
Especially since it is simultaneously
Forbidden to be in existence and
Forbidden to be destroyed
Very real
Very able to be preserved for quite some time
And yet
In a very real way
As ephemeral as the beauty of the first moments of
Morning after a large snowfall
Before shovels
Snow blowers
Plows or
Paperboys
Before it matters that there is no power
And the temperature continues to drop inside the house
Before anything other than snow matters at all

Rapid Development: My Daughter as Korea

Tonight
I tried to make a joke
One I really only wanted my wife to hear
So I spelled it out
But
Being a parent
Is like being The United States
If the United States lived in a house with Korea and
Singapore or
Maybe even India
So
My daughter understood what I’d said
And her mother said “huh?”
And now I am still awake
Wondering whether we are in the 1970’s or the 1980s
And
Thinking about what I have to look forward to next

Pretending to Sleep

I’m pretending to be asleep
We just made dinner for the babies
I made an omelet for Mitchell
It had beans
Mushroom soup
Banana baby food
Cumin
Paprika
Baking powder and
An organic sugar substitute
Mixed in
But no eggs
Mitchell was cool with it, though
He left the cabbage patch a long time ago
Back when his current mother’s mother was still a wee lass
So he ate up without complaining
And even used a fork
When the others were practically diving into the serving pans
It tired him out too, though
So we had to take a nap
Or at least pretend to take a nap
I was kind of hoping I would be allowed to
Pretend I was pretending but
Within thirty seconds
Little brother was poking around
Concerned that I shouldn’t be pretending to sleep
First came the “ups” and
Then
Egged on by a rooster impression from the baby area
Came the little hands
Wedged under my extremities
In an attempt to force me up
Now he has placed his hands on either side of my head
Who knows what is next but
For now
Mitchell and I are still
Pretending to sleep

January

Hat and hood on head
Mittens hanging from his sleeves:
He says only “cold”

If

My life
Sometimes
Rests on an “if”
As if
On the edge of precipice
Even though
I’ve long since
Known whether I’ve fallen
Or not