May Day
Three years divorced.
I’m not sure the ink has dried,
but I can breathe again.
I don’t listen to jazz anymore
but crave
a calm whispering late into the night.
More prayer or meditation
than lament.
I dance at midnight under dark skies
with this gentle man
who welcomes my crying
at the heartbreak of unseen galaxies.
We get lost driving through World’s End,
a dirt road lined with trees
but aren’t worried
about finding our way back.
He searches for landmarks.
I keep my eyes on the curve of the road.
Birthday Eve
The night before your 27th birthday,
there’s no covert wrapping frenzy
in a walk-in closet.
No checking off party-planning tasks,
or last-minute runs to the store.
Like the birthday you were on the edge
of three declaring you wanted a red party.
Plates and napkins; pizza and Kool-Aid.
A Winnie-the-Pooh pirate cake.
The must-wear-red-to-attend invite.
All these years
between your tow-head turning
ash blond. Your voice dropping
deep as a well.
This year, there will be no birthday cake,
no quick trip to New York. You on the other
side of the continent now. At least there is only
land, lake, and mountains that divide us
unlike those dark years – blankets of silence,
heavy as a deep, wet snow.
Those phone calls from a stranger –
an R.A. just doing his job for free room&board –
announcing you were somewhere
I couldn’t reach.
The turn toward light.
And then when my own dark storm
lifted me into a tornado, your voice
pulling me back to ground.
A grown son, holding space for a mother’s grief.
Intersection
Remember how I wanted
into your world
so completely,
I hurricaned my life –
safe from any beast
other than myself.
The first act was a puzzle
riddled dialogue,
set changes tripping
over one another.
But, oh, that second act.
I found my way to the eye,
sent starlings out
to gather you.
It didn’t surprise me
that you rode in on lightning,
tumbled through rumbling
clouds. It was quiet here.
You liked quiet.
The storm played
out in punctuated
strobes of light.
No one ever thought
to look for us here
so we lived out life
under dark skies.
We called our shooting-star
offspring names
forgotten by the light of day.
Dawn Leas is the author of Take Something When You Go (Winter Goose Publishing 2016), and I Know When to Keep Quiet(Finishing Line Press, 2010). Her poems have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies. She’s been a copywriter, English teacher and worked in higher education. Currently, she’s a writing coach and teaching artist for Arts in Education NEPA and the Philadelphia Arts in Education Program, partner organizations of the Pennsylvania Council of the Arts. Please visit www.thehammockwriter.com.