THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF RETURNING HOME

Months have passed since I have lived at my house, and with Sandy's powerful hit, who knows what delays this will bring to my reconstruction. Patience to those who have felt the power of MOTHER NATURE.

The Impossibility of Returning Home

I was not trying to pull you from my forgotten groin

as you licked me with dragon’s fire directly over my metal armor.

I was not trying to forge the inside of your heart with pride,

or change the rusty seat of each wicked muscle.

I was not trying to push opulent words over your façade--

it was your insatiable fire that locked fear in me--

made me turn into an unrecognizable form, a dragon slayer.  Defeat

mixed into my blood and oxygen; I  fed your coral flames with death.

I was not giving into the burn of your speech or

the rake of your claws across my scorched linoleum.

I did not listen to your mouth’s hissing blaze,

as my body felt shame for our impersonal destruction.

I was not trying to burn away anyone’s sins--

not mine, not yours, not filth and soot’s gossamer presence.

Fearlessness settled in my head-- get them out, get them out.

Outside a quiet night passed through me; you drink the rain,

the sweet earth opens, moist dirt mists my nostrils,

white fog lifts from the ground as if to resurrect me to God.   

You take one last breath, exhaling dust onto my unsettled LIFE.

My flesh, your metal, a ghostly bronze angel;

I simply asked for a new kitchen.

 TJKG

SMILE THERAPY 39

Smile Therapy 39

I am in smile therapy
when I roll my daughter's
hair in my mom's hot rollers.

TJKG

marked-FRAGILE

Today.... there is no need for quote just breath, and with this I ask-- Why do people remind us to breathe when things are tenuous in life?

marked-FRAGILE

There are

tiny boxes

inside my head--

some are locked,

and some

I live with like friends,

or  lovers,

and others are

enemies probing for keys.

Some are

filled with horror,

and bliss, and tender,

and lies,

and knives

cutting into my life,

and guile under glass.

And life--it comes with a BREATH--

not boxed inside with the begging

need to be

a sister,

a mother,

a tragedy,

a continuance.  

       TJKG

SMILE THERAPY 38

Smile Therapy 38

I am in smile therapy
when my teenager plays
dress up in my shoes.
Oddly reminds me of the
Wicket Witch of the West.

TJKG

JUST

 Perfection is the greatest form of self-abuse. Tao Te Ching

                                                                                                      T.Kraft

Just...

You just stood and turned,

a poised Norwegian creature, too shy to face   

the reflection of your own imperfections.

Your profile framed in a bar-room window,

coyly waits, just to know if someone will recognize

the slip of delicate fingers over

shimmers of platinum hair, notice

the slight veil of bare eye lids which umbrella

fear from unjust, lips with words just behind them.

Just cause,

the neon jury blinks red,

warning your attempts at not honoring your voice.

TJKG

SMILE THERAPY 37

Smile Therapy 37

I am in smile therapy
when I try and unlock
a public rest room
door with my car keys.

TJKG

SMILE THERAPY 36

Smile Therapy 36

I am in smile therapy
when I sit in a big
blue chair which makes
me feel like I am
Alice in Wonderland !

TJKG

SENTIMENTAL ADDICTION

Sentimental Addiction

Not a sage alternative to cigarettes--

your spit and Skoal mix in a Starbucks’ cup.

Is  your white matter high?

Brown saliva and tobacco,  

battered pine cone, sap

dangling from one corner of your mouth.

I contemplate deference.

Broken lath and broken stone; one heart hung low.

Yellow wires threaded through support beams--

calloused hands barely reach to decorate the

basement ceiling , a soldered red star,

the lines of power  

ruffle nerves abolished on electric wires.

Still can’t reach the tippy top.

Holiday canister fills in as steps,

(gingerly packed last December) work-boot

prints a stranger’s history;

a grown man stands on a child’s memories;

not dead yet not alive.

Battered and abandoned are

disregarded Christmas adoration—

slivers of tinsel, confetti of silver

inlaid in a basement of soot and dirt. 

A new key, a new lock,

an old house

ransacked and scolded by souls

who don’t inhabit or celebrate

the warmth of her hollow heart.

SMILE THERAPY 35

Smile Therapy 35

I am in smile therapy
knowing I am tough
on the inside
with a smile
on the outside.

TJKG