I am going to love you…
For
Commonality
******* In its intensity
Midnight whisper songs… and
Puns and metaphors
Gently passed between fits
Of giggles and almost morning breath…
For
Private Jokes… and
Running gags
Shouting matches… and
Makeup ***
Discarded baggage… and
Tender kisses
For screen doors
Hickory floors
Fishing reels… and
Ill-timed poems
For being unafraid
To grow old… encumbered and entwined…
I am going to love you
For right now… and
For all
the right nows
to come

I lost myself a while back...
not quite sure where… and
the strange thing is
I didn’t even realize I was losin myself…
didn’t just look up one day… and
find myself gone…
lost myself a little bit at a time...
little bits of me...
miniscule soul-full particles...
slow leak...
‘til not only was I supremely empty
but the whole ****** world was
flat...
leavin me head scratchin and puzzled
cuz last time I looked I was there...
right there… where I left me...
so I had to find myself…
a tedious and sometimes dangerous task...
looked high… really really high
and found…  no self
looked low… way too low… and
thankfully… again no self...
looked places that I was sure that I had never been
where I sometimes, surprisedly, found pieces of myself
picked myself up… dusted myself off… held myself close as
gathering slowly myself… growin… into regeneration…
comin together realization…  that I
love
my
self… and
hope
to never again be.. as I once was… so full of myself…
only to just be full…
only to just be…

Perplexed and amazed… and maybe it’s my fault
Probably my fault even…
that it doesn’t appear  to occur to some folks
that there is even a possibility
that I am really NOT thinking about them…
or worrying why
Someone is crying or mad or why the ‘tude
Or if they are hungry or rested or had a fight
Or what they plan to do about their latest dilemma…
Hell… Today… I don’t even need to know the good news…  
Sometimes I've just got things on my mind…  
Like
Who’s gonna do my next pedicure… or
What will be the outcome of this next test… and
today is the anniversary of my mother’s last breath… or how
I wish he was here to kiss my neck… cuz
I do love the way he kisses my neck… and I
Wonder if there is any of that fried fish left…
Ya see…  today I just do not care
What’s going on in their world… cuz I choose... today...
To be about my world and the sound of my own heartbeat… and
I think that I plan to have more of these “about me days” and I don’t
give a **** who doesn’t get it… or feels put upon cuz
It shows that I’m disconnected…
Cuz everybody on this whole spinning rock is so into just themselves
and if I’m into you…  and you into you… then who's into me…?
and perhaps I’m breaking some cardinal rule
by determining at this late date to be
About my own personal thoughts… but I’ma build this mental wall
to protect them from intruders… cuz it is what it is…  and I don’t even feel like explaining that
Sometimes I’ve just got things on my mind…

Okay…
So…
my kids ain't all that regular
thats cuz my kids
didn’t get no regular mama
/ My kids got a / way making / hard working / kid feeding / plant growing  
/ source loving / puppy hugging / kitten saving / truth telling
/ baby kissing / spell casting / candle lighting / hymn singing / literature chewing
/ jambalaya cooking / *** kicking / loud laughing / soft hearted / hard drinking
/ powder digging / dream weaving / moon dancing / braid wearing /  barefooted
/ hippy of a poet-mama…
And I ain't sad that I’m peculiar…
cuz I’m the only me we got…

Though the date may be late… and
Those type things don’t happen anymore…MUCH…dare I say

Those type things don’t happen MUCH anymore… (yes I dared)
It is nevertheless ingrained…

No matter the age or the date
However young or old…
It is in our DNA… and
Our DNA does not forget
Will not allow us
As other cultures will
To easily enjoy
The remote loveliness… and
Maniacally flowering greenery… and
Beauteous quiet of this
Southern forest… this
Confederate lake…  
Without our spirits
Sadly counting
The cumulative number of
Hundreds of years of
Fertilization by
Black Men’s bones…

But like my father and his father before him
We show up anyway…
Albeit somewhat uneasily…
While the native good-ole-boys
Stand stock still and stare
Actin’ like they never seen one’a us before… and
Though we arrived obviously prepared for what we came to do
They still stare… as if
wondering what we could possibly be doing here…
or maybe… how dare we enjoy God’s green earth with our brown selfs…

And my beautiful Black Man
with ease of motion
Audaciously pays the Black Tax
(the quoted price over what the sign says the price is)
As I bait my line in defiance
Albeit somewhat uneasily… and
Cast it out into this confederate lake

And my beautiful Black Man
Also stands… broad shoulders back… and
Pointedly does not acknowledge the presence of the natives
As they stand stock still and stare
But it is there
(We will NOT be afraid… and we will NOT go away)
Unspoken between us... But
Always in the back of the mind…
The recesses of the consciousness…
Preparation for this day… and the worst that it can bring…
Is ingrained…

I mourned the loss of US that died suddenly...
Lowered the flag to half mast
Rent my clothes
Donned sack cloth and ashes
Covered the mirrors with black satin… and
Lovingly prepared green bean casserole and pound cake
Gifted  it to and comforted and assured
myself… that
everything’s gonna be alright…
Offered to myself
Condolences
Which I graciously accepted
yes…
US will be missed
yes…
US was so nice
No…
I didn’t even know that US was sick… and
I mourn US that died suddenly
But not for too long…
After a respectable period of time
****** the satin off of my mirrors
To better see me twirl in my hot red dress
After I lean in… and kiss myself
Throw the green bean casserole out… cuz I hate it
Eat all the pound cake… cuz I love it
Laugh out loud… cuz I am
Comforted and assured… that
Everything’s gonna be alright… and then
…Raise and Let My Free Flag Fly!

Without effort… not even trying… I used to see poems everywhere…

While sitting in my yard of a summer eve… there were poems in the sway of trees… and in the flight of the hummingbird… and in mother cat and her babies … and little girls holding intense conversations… and kids chasing dogs and dogs chasing kids… and little boys ***** from a hard day's play big-eyed and determined to talk to me…

poems… everywhere…

While standing on the bus stop in the hood… there were poems in the kitchen smells calling to me from each little house… and in the swagger of them in training talking loud and testing the waters of manhood… and in the tired face of the tired old woman who should mostly likely have been retired just trying to make it home one plodding step at a time…

poems… everywhere…

Then too much death and illness and suffering… clogged my flow…

So…

I had to make a conscious effort…  to SEE again.. so that I wouldn’t die myself… of obstruction of the expression gate… or collapse from a deficiency of thought originality… or succumb to an overdose of banality… or break down under the weight of too much…ORDINARY

It was hard… but it had to be done… and a poet like me does not give in… a poet like me
can’t help but SEE… eventually…so I looked and I looked…  with an eye toward the esoteric… an eye toward the eclectic… and the beauty... and the color… and it’s working… I’m getting there… I’m getting there… I’m starting to see… though while not… EVERYWHERE… I once again thank The Creator who flows through me that… I do see …

poems ALMOST everywhere…