Boogaloo to the Robot

I hate to say it but our rhythm is off.

I move to the right, you move to the right.

I move up, you move up.

It’s about call and response

you know rhythm and the counter-balance

or perhaps the chance encounter

that got us moving in the first place.

Almost Got A Way

Visions of paradise

clash with morbid ideas

of milk spilled

on manicured lawns.

Tripped up she pauses,

looks down, drops down, to her knees.

She laps, then slaps,

at the noon day sun,

whose blinding brightness,

obscures her need for comfort.

She cannot move fast enough.

Hoisted up, she clings, wails, then pouts.

Strokes of gentle love

make the world a little better.

She almost got a way.

Eden

An apple landed on her head,

knocking her unconscious.

Upon awakening she found

that he had become snakelike–tongue slithering,

mouth snapping, biting.

He had eaten the apple, worm and all.

She massaged the lump on her head

and the pain of her good intentions.

“I just wanted to be a part of you”, she said.

But he went on yapping

like a hungry pup, accusing her

of building stone walls, anger,

and mixed up messages that clouded

the river of his purity.

She sighed, then remembered

that her life was filled with many things of value-

self esteem, a sunny day, a dew-filled morn.

She left him sitting in the park, rambling on and on

to the ghosts and goblins of his own fear,

typing endless messages on his outdated cell phone.

He knew he was right and she was wrong.

Perhaps had they really talked, things would have been different.

But in today’s world, no one talks when there is a crisis.

©2013 Lynn Marshall-Linnemeier

Overslept

The dust is settling

and I am covered in it.

Like a ghost riding in a caravan

I trace memories on the stagecoach window.

If I could do it differently

I would be indifferent, uncaring.

Rub that sentence out, rewrite:

Backed into a corner, I surrender.

Rub that one out too.

Shake off the dust and keep moving.

That’s the one I like.

I am no ghost.

I am not dead.

“Ticket please,” barks the agent.

©2013 Lynn Marshall-Linnemeier

Walking the Grid

Sometimes you have to backup, restore and restart,

Get in sync with what drives you,

enter into a new phase

or tab over to the next one.

Be a shape shifter or just shift,

Pause, delete, alternate.

Control what comes into your life,

Question what is good and what is not.

Insert meaning into a boring task,

Adjust the brightness, so that you can see

Escape to places that welcome solace,

and remember when to go home.

 

©2013 Lynn Marshall-Linnemeier

Lines Between

It’s difficult to read between lines,

especially if the fonts are less than 8 points

and if handwritten you might want to forget it

because you will make up what you cannot transcribe

and a situation could go from bad to worse

or vice versa.

 

© Lynn Marshall-Linnemeier

The Right to Flail Arms

Don’t throw your clothes on right away,

draw the curtains,

light the candles,

and dance.

Make up a beat and shake up the day,

sing to the top of your lungs.

Tell yourself how beautiful you are,

even if you don’t quite believe it.

Doubting is a part of life,

one of those checks that balance.

Truth can be solid, squishy, and fluid,

Believing is a process.

 

©2013 Lynn Marshall-Linnemeier

The Other Tea Time

Four o’clocks awaken at noon,

Bachelors are polishing their buttons.

Paper whites sway with the wind,

and I am turning slowly.

Johnny jumps up from the table,

Elephant ears press hard to hear,

Silence stains embroidered serviettes,

The buttercups pass the butter.

Joseph reaches for his coat,

The dragons snap, “sit down, sit down.”

It seems the cosmos is out of whack

so I stop to smell the roses.

The Bells of Ireland toll the hour

I turn again to face the day,

trying to clean up an unfortunate disaster,

Tea time is over.

©2013 Lynn Marshall-Linnemeier

Another Tea Time

Melancholia enjoys company

She beckons me to leave

the comfort of happiness

to join her for tea

beneath the water oaks

that line the creek.

We sip tea and cry.

“I am perfectly not perfect

flawed, sometimes useless,

sometimes productive,

most times neither”, she weeps.

“Me too”, I reply, wiping

the snot from my nose with my shirt sleeve.

Back and forth she paces,

the hem of her silk gown

the color of gray

makes paths in the sand.

She laments about all of the

things that are wrong in life.

But after about an hour I am exhausted.

Her complaints are solidly etched in my head.

Knowing that she has succeeded,

in ruining what could have been

a perfect day, she smiles.

Runner I

I found my legs

and then learned to walk

but walking was not enough

Tiny me had to go faster, faster, faster.

I needed to run.

And so I did,

around the oval track

400, 800, 1500, in lock step

with my team.

Leaping over hurdles

was like flying.

I run on the streets now,

and through the forest,

the deer wink at me

when I go flying by.

“She is a runner”, they whisper,

“a kindred spirit”.

I blow kisses at them

and disappear into the world

that is my own head.

My thoughts and dreams

fuel my legs forward.

Runner I.

I Run.

I wrote this to remember the Boston Marathon Massacre. Running is a universal sport that engages people from all over the world. My prayers go out to the families of the victims who died and to those who were wounded.

©2013 Lynn Marshall-Linnemeier