Sylvia's Stillborn

Maybe Sylvia was serious when she meant
of her being generous with mother-love with her children-poems.

I am not a mother but have witnessed the parent-pain
for the still-born ones, who appeared to have normal limbs like lines

that flow from one to the next, as if alive
but no amount of inspiration or aspiration

will restore the dead words,
the still images in the mind.

Love is a glass of ice tea

Love is a difficult, puzzling question
whose answer you do not wish to chase.

But it persists like a fish swimming inside
the edges of your stubborn head.

Your mind is an aquarium, draining its water

leaking from eyes, red from heartache. 

Love is a glass of ice tea.
You just keep on refilling it.

But you did not store until rotten, your feelings,
to let them stink like a dead fish.

So, If I remain like a question
still bobbing in your head,

Will you take care of me like a small fish
in the pond of your memories?

Clarity in the Sky

At first, what is above my head is murkier
than a coffee cup mixing black and cream, swirling round
about until disrupted by a rupture of a stone
breaking through, sending ripples, that close quickly
what used to be a path.

There was a promise - things will be clearer
one day at a time this summer. Every day I get closer
to clarity. There is no more movement. The sun is sharp
piercing through what is left, of what used to be like a blanket,
hiding stones, some small, some big.

Today the sky is everywhere blue, and the sun
will journey unresisted. The murkiness is gone
and the wind alone raises the dust, exposing my eyes,
To witness a cloud-less sky.