dana writes a letter home:

Dear mother and father (in the urn), dear pets

dear Freda the gold fish we shamelessly laid under the wooden front steps:

the battlefield of our Gods and demons.

I write to you crying. My earplugs, the soft pink marshmallows of exhortation

I got from the Dollar Tree. I tried to settle down; I tried

to love. love. love. I tried until John Milton and

Little Milton became the same convulsed spectators. I tried to sleep. To doze off.

My hands vanishing like the glare of a migrant child. No one, I swear,

forced me to be so terrible.

I was talking with Timothy, a bottom, at the pride fest, yellow beads around

his neck. A thousand wild eyelids fluttering's in the spring rain. Does the kitchen,

in need of painting with the paint you needed the thinner for? 

"The bullshit we go thru for grace", Tim said. The beautiful moments. And yet

the deprived widow in the same red wallpaper as if making the china float

past her shadow. Lonesome soul.

Holder up of cracked walls. Did she notice the toaster was a GE? Did she even care?

Does anyone long saddled with dynasty notice the objects of their lives? Timothy

waits in the interposed hallway. The poets were right about the moon after all.

page 2. Bulging with fear; being dark as a mud cookie insides. Hiding like the eclipse

hides only to splurge on the sun or the fear of those who tried to look thru the homemade

shade boxes of cardboard cutouts. Dear people planting

flowers in the well of discarded truck tires. Dear people trying to plant sugar trees in Michigan.

Dear people asking who it was, I was; who it is, I am? And who's blind child questions the merits

of uncertainty? Did you see it as it danced across the temper? Did it frighten you?

Was it as bright mother, as what the others say they saw?

Reviews

[kentuck14]

Dana,
A clever idea . . . a letter home . . . though it's hardly your 'normal' letter . . . this is very confessional . . . at least it sounds that way to me. You have weaved some strange images in this and I wonder if this depicts a intentional assortment of real and imagined things. Some are very 'there' while others appear surreal. Tim's statement about grace leaves a mystery. (Is calling him a bottom a play off the actor Timothy Bottoms?) I like the line about the "wild fluttering eyelids." Dana's letter home seems an attempt to explain one's self to others . . . but it seems that it's just too much trouble . . . and who would understand??!! So Dana goes further inward . . . almost as if deliberately avoiding the truth (Whatever that is!?)
Inserting "page 2" continues the illusion of a letter to home. I try to imagine myself reading this letter, the mother whose asked the question . . . Would I know how to answer?!
T

[h d e rushin]

all letters home are episodes of light fingered arrogance. You have to tip toe thru those who saw you as a teenager, a drunk collage student, a homesick, heartbroken amateur disorienting your way thru maturity. They always try to explain yourself to others I suppose.. great insight my friend...love it...dana

[emmajoy]

' Dear people trying to plant sugar trees in Michigan.
Dear people asking who it was, I was; who it is, I am? And who's blind child questions the merits
of uncertainty? Did you see it as it danced across the temper? Did it frighten you? '

Seems a mesh of whether I am or not what I'm supposed to be but never have been sure if this or that person, place or thought actually found me present as requested!!! Perhaps?. Your language always slightly or more bewilders me but, that means one has to try harder to understand the routes you criss-cross in your writing. Must read again.. .. Meantime, in your world - characters are doing what they do.. a foreign place for me but, vital to know about because there seems to be inaccuracies tumbling with your own analysis - perhaps wary, wanting more than you think is a due, yours.. others.. ever hopeful

Have I lost the plot, dana?"

[h d e rushin]

you write poems of virtual realness. Which I love. I sometimes write as if looking for raspberries, which I myself despise/ which is a meander between going and coming. I'm getting closer to bringing it all together I feel. Thank you for your kind remarks my friend...dana

[Tom27]

Your writings are still amazing as ever. I feel despondent, despair while reaching out for attention and love. I love writings that can make me feel emotion(s). Great work.

[h d e rushin]

thank you so much Tom27 for those kind words my friend..dana

[Robert Trakofler]

You are irrefutably you and from where this bunny stands it is a brilliant shining magnificence! I know I say this a lot to you but its so worth repeating what a voice you have and it blleds thru true and fine in your lines and everything between them! always a pleasure to read your treasure Dana

[h d e rushin]

thank you dearest Bad.....I love your words tonight..dana

[jacob erin-cilberto]

we spend most of our lives trying to live up to expectations of our parents...and then our conscience comes into play after they pass...we are still trying to please them...and we are constantly apologizing for coming up short...
life is so uncertain...yet we certainly try to be often times something we are not.
j.

[h d e rushin]

yes we do Jacob....our entire lives...thanks for your comments my friend...dana