Tummy Tuck

Who’s that?
That lady in the mirror
The one with the gray streak in her hair
Oh no, crows feet creep around her eyes
Laugh lines and worn hands that tell her story

Wait just a minute supple breast
Don’t be in a hurry
Don’t head south too quickly
We have more blouses to fill
We have more nights to give and
To receive pleasure
A wonder bra now will have to give the illusion

Oh womb that carried precious cargo
Little ones I gave you my thin body
In return you left me fulfilled
I guess you paid your bill
The cost for the time
You occupied the space
Forever leaving your marks

Underneath the tummy hiding
A longtime friend
Hidden—I lift the tummy to say hello
I pamper her I perfume her
She’s changing—but the day
She turns gray
I believe I’ll faint
For now she’s still longing still awake

Although once I thought she died
I wept at her funeral
Mourning her passing forever
Now she has been shaken
Resurrected or awaken
From a seemly medically induced slumber
Girl, where have you been?
I’ve been missing you

Thighs, oh thighs
Life was easier when you were strangers
Too close for comfort to familiar now to separate

I’ve tried a little of this
I’ve tried a little of that
Never thought I would end up here
Thinking I am fat

Vain as it may seem
I long to be lean
Young and full of life
Fewer days now are ahead

Knowing that can not be
Right now I would settle
To just be able to
Buckle my shoe

Brown Girls

A glimpse of myself
I see in the mirror
At first almost as if surprised
Maybe I thought I’d see another
Someone else staring back at me

A second look
No, she’s the same
The same as the day before

Some brown girls
Long to be white
I say, no, I don’t agree

Some brown girls
Long to be fair
Yellow, is what some say
They look with envy
Why couldn’t it be me?

I wash my face, examine it again
The darkness of my eyes
The roundness of my nose
The fullness of my lips
The curl of my hair
I claim them—own them
They are mine

Pretty was never a word
Used to describe me
I look again to see
See if I can see
What pretty is to me

A long time ago
I vowed to myself
When I got old enough
I would re-design myself

Make myself be who
I always wanted to be
Cleopatra
Maybe even Sheba

I look in my case
To find the right colors
With expectation
I apply some paint

Some may not approve
Be real—not fake
Real—that’s for each of us to discover
Discover what it takes
To make it on this journey

Wait one last touch
You look good I tell myself
I look again-- as if surprised
Taking one last look
To see if I approve

Pretty, you may not see
But I must say
I love the pretty brown girl
In the mirror-- staring back at me

God said let us make man
Make him in our own image
Created by God
His life dwelling inward

The image you see
Apart of His glory
Whatever He created—He called good
Including Brown Girls

Freda

A precious jewel—natures own hewed art of stone
Her amber color matched only
By her beauty within
The translucent brightness of this gem
Unmatched—another I have yet to discover

The softness of this gem’s glow
Parallel to that of her voice
But her words weighted with love and wisdom
This gem named by the Greeks meaning electric—hers peaceful
Her hugs they comfort like the warmth from a fire

Stones that once housed roaming insects
Her spirit too takes you in—as if you were orphaned
Like her, these gems used to calm and to protect

A natural mother many have
To find the love of another is a gift
Predestinated far beyond this gem known since the Stone Age

Homer too admired the stone
I admire its fleshly equal
Divine mercy surely was granted to me
When time gave me this ambered jewel--named Freda

Two Men Walking

A man stumbles upon a road
The way an abandoned path,
Surroundings the remnants of a fled city
The pavement grown up Spanish moss covers,
Like spider webs—weaved like tapestry
The beginning intertwined with the ending.
The gauntly limbs of weeping willows,
Cocoon the entrance shadowing its egress,
Openly making this way their own.

In this desolate place the air so thick it can be touched.
Anxiety rolls in like fog he begins to gasp—he is afraid
From behind the mercury foliage appears a man,
Someone this lost man has never seen;
But somehow he seemed familiar.
So, the man dazed not knowing how he came into this scene
And not knowing how to get out.
Ask him for direction

The stranger doesn’t hesitate to help his new lost friend.
Walking they talk—they both listen,
All the cares of his heart the stranger does read.

At the end of the way he wants to thank him for his guidance,
He turns in his direction—as quietly as he appeared he left the same.
He glared back at the path he had traveled it was not as dark as before.
He realized he didn’t ask the stranger’s name,
But somehow he knew he would see him again.

The Root

If it is true that loving money makes man evil and that it infectiously entangles the heart. Then this must have been what was wrong with Judas. But when did it start; when the widow in faith gave her last two mites or was it when he envious gawked at the woman bathing Jesus’ feet with the oil from her alabaster’s box?

However it began, it became an evil root that never was plucked out--becoming like the weeds that annoyingly grow in one’s garden. One would have to ponder did they grow accidentally or were they deliberately planted? If intentional, then who is the gardener that plants this seed--the seed of the root that produces such manner of fruit? The fruits of impiety that will cause a man to deny a part of his flesh or make a woman sell hers—only later to be ashamed.

Exactly how does this gardener choose his ground and what does he use to cultivate it? How does he know if the soil is pliable to yield the kind of fruit derivative from this infectious root?

Perhaps we should use Judas as our template. His last words not recorded--evidently only ungodly repentance. But what we could garner is that these roots do not grow over night. It takes time for this infection to blossom, secretly festering after while leaving no room for an antibiotic cure. And by the time it’s noticed, it is like the mold found on stale bread—it shows up at the corner but it’s spread all the way through. And the disguised foliage of this evil is covered with canker worms eating away at the heart it has now suffocated.

This strange fruit hanging from these vines—rotten—rotten like the gushed out bile of Judas.

Between Seasons

Between Seasons

Winter morning, cold like the end of times, the atmosphere suffused with remnants of winter’s resistance. This morning the trees appear to be leaning looking like frail shivering old men—chilled down to their souls. The leaves that once adoringly clothed them are gone; they are now transparent exposed to the bare bones.

Hard to imagine at the peak of their majesty when buds of life evolved to colors of gold. Passing time brings swift changes, one day a giver of shield from the heat, a home for a mother’s young, a yielder of sweet fruit--now only these skeletal like figures remain. Only the photographic memories stored in their mind’s attic record the past days.

Still standing like inexorable doormen, waiting for a recess on this course, the biting wind howling, the fog hovering—holding back hope. Only the osmosis of the veiled sun offers some form of answers. The cold moist air cracking away at skin that is now unable to defend from natures blow. The bitter stillness birthing insanity instead of the expected new life. They are merely existing amid today and tomorrow, limbs weighed down frozen at their knees—trying not to give into the austerity of this place.

These old men-like trees, between seasons, space without form or time. To them nothing now makes sense—their world has disappeared like the fireflies that once danced around
their heads. Life’s rubble fills their pockets like the sap in bare holes. They wait on the forecast—for any mark of an end.

Who has survived this plight?—maybe the trees who have been here before. Wisdom did they leave? None any can find—just quotes to misunderstand. Sayings, rhymes, riddles, folklores, and old wives tales—discarded like the slips in Chinese fortune cookies.

Sometimes I talk to Myself

Sometimes I talk to myself
Conversations so deep and real
I know that they are untrue

Reality often seems so harsh
Sometimes life seems so uncertain
I have to check in--make sure I’m headed in the right direction

Solomon said he was like a child
Not knowing how to go in or out
Wisdom he did ask of the Father
Liberally He will give it and hold none back

When I can’t find a friend
Someone to speak kind words to
I find a friend in me
We laugh, we wonder
We reason together

Sometimes I talk out loud
Sometimes at a whisper
Its okay I say—everyone does it too

If you don’t try it sometimes
You’ll soon discover it’s true

You don’t have to watch what you say
Don’t have to guard every word
No misunderstandings
No feelings to try not to hurt

The answers I find
The ones to life’s hard questions
I could seek silver-- like some
Others gold

But I seek the wisdom
To make it through life’s journey
It comes with experience
Lessons that unfold

Some may call this reflection
Meditation--even internalizing
I just call it what it is
Sometimes I talk to myself—and sometimes I talk to His Spirit