Telling the Truth

connecting the dots of my life

Category: Haiku/Poetry

September 19, 2017

Is this a poem?

I’m not sure.
But this is what happened
just as I was wondering
whether I have a life….

Taking the long walk this evening
we turned left at the intersection
and headed downhill around a curve.

The narrow road stretches between houses
silent with stately lawns that lounge
before, around and behind them—
beautifully landscaped and green.

Well-kept trees rustle in cool downdrafts
from the sky overcast and heavy with
misty air and the still-warm remains of this day.

We come up over a slight rise
and see her—a doe standing downhill
frozen at full attention on the road–
tentative and alert as if to inquire
after our intentions or take our measure.

Behind us, a car approaches in the distance.

In a flash the doe bounds into the bushes
turns and looks back across the road–
waiting.

A second doe leaps across the road,
then turns to look back expectantly.

After a long pause a fawn stumbles noisily
across the road followed by a second fawn
and then silence as the little family dashes
into the trees and shrubs with their
white tails flashing….

I’m pretty sure I have a life.
It’s just that many days it isn’t as planned.
Predictability has flown into the woods
and left me playing life by ear.

©Elouise Renich Fraser, 19 September 2017
Response to WordPress Daily Prompt: Tentative

11 Comments
September 18, 2017

Monday Morning after Margie

Bent on a mission from God
Not derailed by frivolous sidetrips
One painful step at a time
Thoughtfully paced and ordered
You showed up at God’s doorstep
Right on time

Too early for me and for your friends
Left gaping at the huge sinkhole
In our hearts and in that pew
where you were not sitting yesterday
Our breath sucked into silence
at the news of your death
I will not call glorious

In memory of a friend, one of the Angels in my life. She died Saturday afternoon.

©Elouise Renich Fraser, 18 September 2017
Photo taken by DAFraser, Longwood Gardens, Sept 2017
Response to WordPress Daily Prompt: Glorious

16 Comments
September 15, 2017

before the sun goes down

unexpected tears sting my eyes
as I walk through the churchyard
my spirit inhales the bittersweet taste of home
beneath this sanctuary of towering trees
standing watch over silent gravestones

parents hurry past me
toward the grade school open house
across the street
oblivious to the invitation to stop
and rest a while before the sun goes down

yesterday evening, on my way home

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 15 September 2017
Photo taken by DAFraser from our home, November 2014
Daily Prompt: Finite

7 Comments
September 9, 2017

Considering Loss on the Eve of Our Wedding Anniversary

Wedding Day, 11 September 1965
11 September 1965

Fear of loneliness
Drifts in and out unbidden

Heavy eyelids droop
Head hangs low over keyboard

Tangled thoughts intrude
Try to distract me as though
I were the intruder

I am not.

Pulling myself together
I rouse myself to the occasion
Reaching for stars and light
I do not own.

What if he dies first?
What if I die first?

I don’t know.

So what do I know?
Only this –
That if he dies first, I will grieve.

And what will be the shape of that grief?
A hole that stretches from here to eternity
An unreachable planet long ago and faraway
A place I can no longer visit
An ocean of heaving sobs
Seaweeds of bitter regret and sweet longing
Washing up on the shore of each long day and night

On Monday David and I will celebrate our 52nd wedding anniversary. I thought I knew a thing or two about love the day we married. I did not. Nor will I know all about love the day one of us dies.

The older I get, the more precious each day becomes. I remember dreading retirement. Not simply because I would miss my colleagues and students, but because I would be spending much more time with D. More than I’d spent with him most of our married life.

Could we live with each other in the same house, including the same kitchen, every day? Would we get bored out of our gourds without deadlines and meetings and endless reports? Would one of us decide to find a part-time job just to get away from it all?

Happily, we’ve survived so far, including Kitchen Wars. But that would be another story.

I’ve had death on my mind in the last weeks, given events here and around the world. Death is about more than statistics, more than a moving memorial service, more than a huge display of candles and flowers. More than a gut-wrenching news story of the moment.

Somewhere, each moment of every day, someone is grieving. I want to honor the value of just one person’s life and the value of grief. The kind that can soften us, making us more human than we were before.

It looks like Monday, our anniversary day, will be a beautiful Longwood Garden day. Maybe another walk in the Meadow? We’ll see.

Thanks for reading!
Elouise♥

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 9 September 2017
Response to WordPress Daily Prompt: Overcome

23 Comments
September 8, 2017

We don’t marry disaster

We don’t marry disaster
It marries us
Unrelenting drought
Genocidal ethnic cleansing
Polio and opioid epidemics
Avalanches of pain and anguish
Wild fires breathing fury
Hurricanes and floods of destruction
Nature’s fury turned inward
Human fury turned outward
Multiplied exponentially

See the pictures in my scrapbook?
Like pages of a newspaper
Good news one day
Disaster the next
See that man who’s smiling?
That beautiful woman over there?
Those precious children looking your way?
The young people who think no one is looking?
There they were just yesterday
And now…..

What’s to become of us?
The ‘us’ that doesn’t exist anymore
Families torn apart
Friends for life now foes forever
Enemies within and without
In whom do we trust?
In whom do we place our hope?
False saviors arise from glowing ashes
Snake oil dealers hawk their sleazy wares

I get up in the morning
And look outside, up toward the heavens
Where the bright face of a newly waning moon
Reflects the light of a new day just dawning.
Two birds swoop silently together into an oak tree
High overhead a silver airplane leaves a misty trail
Fluffy clouds drift beneath a deep blue sky
Signs of hope and reason enough to get up
And live yet another day in my small corner
Of this world filled with small people,
Large hearts and infectious smiles.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 8 September 2017
Response to WordPress Daily Prompts: Finite; Crescendo

9 Comments
September 4, 2017

fraught labor of love

fraught labor of love
priceless heart wrenching venture
no promise of gain
beyond a nest of birdlings
precious precarious joy

Last week was the first week of school around here. On Friday evening D and I were walking past the grade school near our house. Only one car remained in the faculty parking lot.

A woman carrying a large bag and other take-home items left the building and walked toward the car. She looked a bit weary, though not unhappy. I greeted her and said something about hoping she enjoyed the long holiday weekend.

She smiled, laughed, and said something like this, “You know, I’ve got the best job in the world! It just takes a while to get ready for the next day.”

I couldn’t have related more, told her so, and turned to walk on with D.

On a whim, I turned and asked about her best job in the world. I’d assumed she was an administrator type. I was more than surprised when she replied, all smiles, “I teach kindergarten and I just love it!”

So why was she leaving so late? She’d just finished setting up her classroom for the next day of school!

I love children. And I loved teaching adults. I would not, however, be the best mama or papa bird to deal with an overcrowded nest of small, vulnerable, hungry, eager, noisy, precious birdlings.

So here’s to a Happy Labor Day! Especially for all educators who love caring for and about our children.
Elouise♥

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 4 September 2017
Photo found at animal.memozee.com
Response to WordPress Daily Prompts: Priceless; Educate

7 Comments
September 2, 2017

shadows

shadows of women
I may once have been recede
within a forest
fragrant firs bend branches low
heavy with pregnant brown cones

I had a waking half-dream this morning–the first three lines of the tanka above. How to end it? I don’t want more of the woman I’ve already been–though I don’t want to lose her entirely. Rather, I want to be born yet again into a life that suits me today.

This half-dream seemed to say I’m at least half-way there. Besides, this is Labor Day weekend. A most propitious time for dreaming about possibilities.

Labor Day celebrates the everyday women, men and young people who labor to get the job done. Many labor under duress in less than healthy, safe, life-giving conditions. A good time to dream about possibilities.

Elouise♥

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 2 September 2017
Photo found at pinterest.com
Response to WordPress Daily Prompt: Continue

10 Comments
August 31, 2017

The high cost of loving

Just when I think
I’ve memorized
Every line in your face
Death rewrites it

My heart stops beating
Memory fails
A lump in its throat

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 31 August 2017
Response to WordPress Daily Prompt: Memorize

4 Comments
August 30, 2017

Besotted with Strangers?

Wandering from our roots
We forget the manner of our lives
Those who took us in
When we were strangers
To ourselves and others

We drown in a wilderness
Of our calculated making
Locking doors and barring windows
Buying and carrying weapons
Determined to remain standing

Waves of anger and cries for mercy
Go unheeded in this dry land
Now inundated with people
Desperate for affirmation
A threat to our ways of life

I wonder. Is it time to become besotted with Strangers?

Perhaps we could begin with the Strangers we’ve become to ourselves and others. We might even use Strangerhood as the defining description of our ‘neighborhoods’ including towns, governing bodies, reservations, prisons, churches, schools, businesses, families and cities.

A childhood Christmas carol came to mind this morning. It celebrates a dear little stranger born in a manger. The Christ child. Helpless, unknown, without rank or title, an at-risk baby, poor in wealth and status.

At every turn he welcomed and received strangers into his life. Including religious leaders who often sought to entrap him, officials and citizens who criminalized him, and his motley crew of fearful disciples who abandoned him at the end.

We aren’t the Christ child. We can, however, ask for grace and courage to reflect the truth of his life. Not for our own health and wealth, but because it offers a way to become neighbors to ourselves and others. Especially those we now see as strangers in ‘our’ land, or strangers to ‘our’ way of life or beliefs or political alignments.

Every human disaster is a reminder that we need each other. Especially those others who threaten or disrupt our tidy ways of seeing ourselves and them.

Your thoughts and comments are most welcome. Thanks for listening!
Elouise ♥

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 30 August 2017
Response to WordPress Daily Prompt: Enamored

7 Comments
August 29, 2017

There’s a chill in the air

There’s a chill in the air
this morning.
I warm my old skin
with soft flannel
and walk through my museum
of relics.
Nothing rhymes today.
Reason flew south months ago
leaving only my heart
and you.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 30 August 2017
Painting found at forhumanliberation.blogspot.com
Response to WordPress Daily Prompt: Rhyme

6 Comments