My husband's poetry

Category: Aging

  • Rhinocerous rain

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    by

    cfblack
    in , , , , , , ,

    Driving north out of Nashville, traffic thickens to a slow confession near Fort Campbell, brake lights bloom like votive candles stretching out into Kentucky. I think of Thomas Merton, cloistered among the knobs and forests of Gethsemani Monastery. Where silence became a discipline. Prayer was not an escape, but another way of entering the world.…

  • Thick and muddy

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    by

    cfblack
    in , , , , , ,

    This morning the pond is thick and muddy; turtles still must extend their heads above the water to breathe. Geese teach goslings how to swim and dive for food. Mallards rest quiet on shore, while cattails grow slender and tall. Trees shake last night’s rain upon my head as I count the name of Light…

  • Scented candles

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    by

    cfblack
    in , , ,

    Summer days burned like scented candles. Flames bent to drafts we could not feel. Whiffs of smoke vandalized the brightness of time, smudged the walls of tomorrow’s room. Slow ruin settled in like urban squatters. Residue learned our names, waited in corridors of breath, COPD grew mold in our chest and now speaks in pidgin…

  • Nest of leaves

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    by

    cfblack
    in , , , ,

    sun bleached bench pine cone nests on leaves you think maybe a squirrel has hidden it in plain sight or maybe it fell in the night and landed there like you fell in the night and landed here neither of you had control over the decision to exist and neither of you has control over…

  • Epsom salts

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    by

    cfblack
    in , , ,

    Sitting on the porch scalding my feet in Epsom salts. Rocking back and forth in an old chair. Lamenting the sacrifice of the tree. Wondering what other pieces were torn from its corpse. Does it mourn the loss of siblings living in other homes or that fell off the dock at the furniture store. Sitting…

  • Poem for a young friend

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    by

    cfblack
    in , , ,

    I sleep restless and sometimes dream about what I might have become, if I had taken the other path. That path still forks out before me, but I have grown content with this life and it no longer calls my name. Come, sit with me for coffee; we will listen for your name on the…

  • hope

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    by

    cfblack
    in , ,

    yesterday, unable to wash the dirt of my youth from my skin I put on cologne and clean clothes and hope no one remembers who I was today, I do not recognize the face in the mirror or the voice that mumbles morning prayers I undress, step into the shower, towel off, put on cologne…

  • For Barb and Kathy

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    by

    cfblack
    in , ,

    on an old green swingset, new to us, we launched ourselves so high in the sky It threatened to tip us backward in the grass we would fling ourselves towards the sun competing who could fly the furthest I used to win a lot maybe, it was because I did not fear the landing or…

  • —

    by

    cfblack
    in ,

    I used lie awake at night listening to trains wail in the distance and dream of running away to ride the rails to far off places Now I lie awake at night listening to trains wail in the distance but I’m too afraid to ride up under a train for fear I may fall 1-8-25

  • Phone calls with old friends

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    by

    cfblack
    in ,

    we speak of the approach of autumn the dimming light the struggle to gracefully hold on to the end of twigs before surrendering to the wind 8-25-2024