Painted by my talented cousin, Richard Lewis. Click the picture to learn more about him.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

A View of Things My Mother Taught Me

My mom should've been a teacher.


She should've been in front of a classroom, with an apple on her desk, kids lining up to clean the chalkboard erasers, and a stack of papers with gold stars she'd award to each student for their efforts. I say this because some of the most valuable, enduring lessons I learned were from her. Here are a few of them.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

A View of "It's Kind of a Family Story"

(A poem in memory of my grandmother, who was an amazing character.)



A note of refusal to the handyman who wants to hang new drywall in my laundry room

It’s kind of an odd story, those balls of lint stuck to my laundry room wall. Funny you should ask about it. My grandmother would scoop lint out of the trap in her old washer, and fling it onto the wall, gleefully singing childhood songs at the top of her lungs as she did:

“Once upon a time/the goose drank wine/the monkey chewed tobacco on the street car line/the street car broke/the monkey got choked/and they all went to heaven but the old billy goat….”

Sunday, November 13, 2011

A View of A Remembrance of Sunday Dinner

(Thinking of and missing my father today.  Had he lived, he would've been 68 years old.  I love you, Daddy.)



The sun sparkles like precious jewels
set in a tower of gold off the windows
of a building dedicated to revival.
Blue lights shine on blue water, lapis on sapphire.
A memory washes over me, a genuine moment,
a buried treasure drifts ashore.

Friday, November 11, 2011

A View of "Tell Them I'm a Veteran"

Today, I think of so many people.


I think of my father, who enlisted in the Air Force hoping to see the world.  He was sent to Texas and Alaska.  His dream of world travel did not materialize.  Still, he served proudly and honorably.


Tuesday, November 8, 2011

A View of How I Define Feminism


(This is a revision to "I'm a Feminist," a poem I posted earlier.  This revision is part of a class assignment and in direct response to the news out of Mississippi, where there is a push to redefine women's rights to the point where some forms of birth control would be rendered illegal.  Proposition 26 wants to define legal "personhood" as the point when sperm meets egg and the group behind it has stated they are against certain forms of birth control - IUDs, birth control pills, and other methods which prevent a fertilized egg from implaning in the womb.  This could set a dangerous precedent in terms of eliminating a woman's right to choose, a precedent that should not be allowed to take hold.)

“Every time we liberate a woman, we liberate a man.” - Margaret Mead

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

A View of I do not like poinsettias

(A poem about my father's memorial service.  His birthday, and the anniversary of his death, are later this month.)

I do not like poinsettias

Those red leaves make me see red, leave me red faced,
like the priest who stood on the altar
apologizing instead of eulogizing,
I did not know your father… I’m told he was a good man….
Stammering, straining for words, a man
who knew he would never wear red, stood shamed
by words flailing from his cheeks like injured cardinals.
Flustered red swam with festive red in a sea of charcoal gray;
charcoal gray vestments, charcoal gray chapel
charcoal gray sky that blotted out sun rays straining
to shine through glass stained poinsettia red.
The sky, it seems, did not like poinsettias.