OH, THIS BRAIN OF MINE

This brain of mine

Called bipolar

Is given plenty of drugs

To draw in the poles

And shrink the swings in its behavior.

But every half a year or so,

It still climbs the pole

Called manic

And I exhale - I’ll have a couple of weeks of feeling

More like myself, and relief

From that flat brain and its trips down the pole

Called depression

I wake up ready

To get out of bed and do stuff;

The stuff I went to bed thinking of -

And I think of stuff!

I do things while I’m doing things -

I can do several things fluidly –

Putting my hands to one after the other.

I sing show tunes out loud – usually Oklahoma! –

Oh, what a beautiful morning!

My room is clean before I know I cleaned it,

And poems write themselves in my head,

And I have to scribble to keep up with them,

And I eat standing, and plan the next thing

I’ll do after the dishes,

I finish all my half-knitted scarfs,

And feel ten pounds lighter,

Or ten times stronger,

Or ten years younger,

Or something.

I wake up, and I feel, and I do -

Whenever this brain of mine

Like a brightly colored flag

Climbs up the pole

I call MYSELF.

My Mom

This one is for my mom
who worries about me
when she reads my sad poems.

She's a mother bear,
ready to maul anyone
who would try to hurt me.

But what is she supposed to do
when I seek out my own pain
and revel in it?

Her precious cub
has wandered off
and tends to mope.

But she manages to love me,
to love my sad words
fiercely, from afar.

I want to tell her that
I'm happy being sad - I'm happiest
when sad words come together in a poem.

I wish my sad wouldn't make her sad.
I wish my happy could make her happy,
but in every case she loves me.

SEED

(image source: http://mindsparkenigma.blogspot.com.au/2010/04/seed.html)

The seed of pain

is planted in my left heel,

like a stone unnoticed until

I stand.

It speaks with each step:

Stop! What do you think you’re doing?

I think I’m walking.

It's something to do

besides food, alcohol, money, internet, sex -

the one thing I can think of

that should cause me no harm

while I avoid facing pain.

After some miles

The sprouting seed reaches up,

Unfolding tender leaves into my ankle

With every step now the pain blossoms

And shouts. But my right foot continues

To catch my forward movement.

After more miles

Pain is an established plant

Echoing when I’m off my foot,

Sending new shoots to my knee with each limp.

I know I must stop walking.

Soon. I sit down.

The seed of pain

is planted in my heart,

noticed no matter how hard I try not to.

Wine is no herbicide.

It speaks with each word I write:

Stop! what do you think you’re doing?

I think I’m facing myself finally,

or at least trying to stop

with the running away in every way I run,

To face whatever this root of truth is

So I write - name things,

Look it square.

After some time

the sprouting seed reaches up,

unfolding tender leaves into my tear ducts and sinuses.

With every word now pain blossoms,

and shouts – true names: 

Lost, Failed, Broken, Alone.

After more words

the plant is established, but not the same

as the stunted weed that started.

Now that I have let it live in the light,

It bears mysterious fruit:

Healing, peace, release, rest.

I know at some point I will

Let the garden go back to seed.

I don't like pain. No matter what grows.

So I will write as long as I can stand, then stop.

This is why it takes my heart

So long to get anywhere.

Merciless Muse

A man who had painted himself all blue

Shouts political diatribes into a megaphone,

Without pause for breath. He shouts

At everyone, at no one, about

Everything wrong.

I sit and listen respectfully for a while,

Then, when I walk past, I thank him for speaking,

Wanting to honor the effort it takes

To express himself so honestly.

He ignores me.

I suppose that you don’t paint yourself blue,

And shout into a megaphone, if you care what

Anyone thinks, or need some woman’s approval.

He serves a merciless muse,

Poor man.

AWKWARD

From the bus, I watched a man

with his pants pulled up high,

white socks with dress shoes, oafish,

walking as if a stiff wind fought him. I thought…

What does he do for a job?

Do his coworkers like him?

Tolerate him? Tell stories?

Has he loved someone?

Has someone tried to love him?

And how do any of us make it through life?

I mean, we don’t, of course.

We all die from something.

But before we die, we live, 

limp along,

Walking funny, talking funny, dressing funny,

Hurting

Others and ourselves,

And being hurt,

Laughing our asses off out loud,

Wasting time, and our time

Is so precious.

How do we make it through?

Loving and fearing,

Dying every day,

Wanting things and losing things,

And holding things too tightly,

Trying, TRYING,

We are all just trying.

We all walk into a stiff wind.