Fragile

I took my two year old son out for a walk this morning,
and in the grass of our front yard
I saw a broken butterfly wing;
I picked it up without thinking
(or malice)
while my child pointed elsewhere, exclaiming
“Butterfly!  Look! Hurt Butterfly!”
I gently stroked the wing in my hand:
Orange, and black and yellow,
soft and velvet,
almost not there
save for the realness of its broken gone-ness.

We walked around the yard,
and I noticed all the fragile little things
littered in the browning grass:
A humming bird nest
Rose petals
A spider web
The shell from a bird’s egg
The white crown of a dandelion,

ready, waiting, calling to be blown
dispersed and carried on the light breeze
like the soul of a flower
to be shared and grown again;

We walked;
the whole while, my son singing
in that lisp-y, high pitched slur
that toddlers do,
“Ashes! Ashes!
All Fall down!”

After a while I carried him;
I crushed him close to me,
smelled his breath
felt his heartbeat,
the curl of his fingers
and the softness of his skin;

All the fragile things
Precious and rare,
Like the wings of a butterfly

 

---

 

So here’s a contest, just for you.  Yes, you.  Click the link…go on…

 

Writing To Reach you

There’s the trick, really.
A turn of phrase
A syllable or two
a sentence with aftermarket parts and
shoehorns used to squeeze words into meaning
like so much simile
painted on a page with a typewriter paintbrush;

harsh letters stamped under the glow of
incandescence and little else
I ask you to allow me to
Assault your sensibilities for a minute
(or five)
and hold onto your attention for a gap of
one thousand words or so;

You stop, and for a moment
(a brief moment)
You’re hearing my voice
in your head
telling you nothing about everything
and everything about nothing;

My wife tells me stories
(sometimes)
of how her mother would
put together a sign
some price tags
and lay out a garage sale;
People would come by
look at her wares
and and maybe talk to her;

To have someone reach out and touch her
Connect
Human Being to Human Being
To reach and be
with people.
To Be;

Sometimes the words,
They take their own path
in the wee hours
and they wend
and wind
and reach out
searching to you
or you, or you, or you
hoping to touch you in the ether
and in the world.

 

---

 

So here’s a contest, just for you.  Yes, you.  Click the link.  Do it!