Ten aren't enough

stop, Stop! Stop the pain!

"Ten fingers and toes",

sigh, watch as he grows.

stop, Stop! Stop the truck!

He hit the lamp post,

for he didn't look back.

stop, Stop! Stop the driver!

He's gone in the twilight

and forgotten his headlights.

stop, Stop! Stop the trip!

He's left home

without his phone.

stop, Stop! Stop for gas!

The tank was low

and he had no cash.

Even if stopped, silent, and still,

our son at the wheel

gives me the chills.

(True story, just because we can count 10 fingers and toes at birth, doesn't mean he'll keep them!)

Woman of the vine to Gilgamesh:

As for you, Gilgamesh, let your belly be full,

make merry day and night. 

Of each day make a feast of rejoicing,

Day and night dance and play!

Let your garments be sparkling fresh,

your hair be washed, bathe in water.

Pay heed to the child holding your hand,

Let your spouse delight in your embrace.

(...for death is the fate of man.)

This the advice from the Epic of Gilgamesh, as the king searched for immortality and mourned the loss of his beloved brother and companion. Written on clay tablets 2000 years BC in Mesopotamia.  Have we learned it yet?

My poetry reading nights

Where you read from an unfolded square,

drawn as a handkerchief

to catch my tears

and blow my nose.

Where you whisper

prayers to the gods of life

and rattle charms of beaded and feathered gourds

against the chains of death,

Where your hands press open the pages

awarded satin ribbon markers,

the corners creased

by fingers licked with a chocolate tongue,

Where men chant

as softly as the mother 

who closes her eyes to sing

to an infant in the dark,

Where women bare the shame of 

irregular butts and bloody panties,

and where I have to imagine you 

in your wrinkled and sweaty underwear

just to have the courage to enter here…..

Where a slap in the face

might as well be on my upended newborn butt

and I still find the courage to see you

in your wrinkled underwear,  

just to read to you,   here,   tonight….                                         1-19-2012   DGG 

Lowest winter
sun rose
warming inner
window pane