Every so often on my solo-blog, I'd feel compelled to write little prose poems that I called The Gratitudes. I planned to sprinkle them throughout a collection and even did a collaborative set with Lady Cynthia Arrieu-King which will appear in our chapbook sometime later this year.
Every so often, I feel a little bevy of gratitudes breeze through and I know that I need to stop and note the elusive, wonderful things. It's a lazy day at Chez Poppycakes. Air-conditioning down, heat up, the Mister out at work, the bro-in-law hard at work repairing the long-neglected poolhouse. The bedroom though, is cool enough, the sliding glass doors open to birdsong and that light-of-well-being that late afternoon brings to the roofgarden, filtered and gold-leafing.
The Gratitudes
For the kind of birdfeeder, open-wire mesh, meant for black sunflower seeds and shaped like a wind-filled berry, for the hummingbird that darted between us to get to the red succulent, that for a terrified moment, we thought it something vicious and then, all at once, felt the thrill of the gemstone-vibrancy. For the blackberry patch across the yard, wild fruits and reminders of blackberry picking years ago, when the fruits were a necessary supplement to a desparate budget. For that memory, that echo, these berries, those berries, the then I loved dearly, the now that I cherish even more for that sweet, ripe then. For whimsical gatherings in birthday boots that recall more thens (thirty-plus years back) Evanston, Wyoming, blond leather and the gypsy roses added now, for fun. For fun, the daily laughter of two who know sadness well, and choose to revel in the turquoise clarity of the wonky Buster Crabbe pool, listening to folk music and happy to have found each other. For the bundle of yard-picked flowers, golden-yellow and brought to the door by golden-haired little girls to wish my beloved a healing, for the lime-green yarn, the littlegirlfinger-sized rabbit ears of bow tied so carefully that hold those flowers close and together, singing their golden hearts out.
