Pillow Talk

Him: "My goal is to read ALL the books."
Me: "Oh, you mean like all the books we own?"
Him: "No. I mean like, ALL the books."
Me: -laughter- (Folks, he's serious).

Heirloom Rifle

For Rick
The present has muscled its way off my tongue.
We are building, dear: soon we'll have spare
rooms and a fireplace and a collection of shape-
less boxes and borrowed furniture. We will rifle
through our new space and hang photos and ration
the money we spend and the food we eat. Your body

is a room to me - you are a structure in my house, a body
of security and curiosity. The taste on my tongue
is bittersweet bliss as I patiently store my spare
change and count down the days until love takes shape
in elegant wood beams and plaster walls. Sometimes I rifle
through your things when you're gone and steal a ration

of your canned good memories. Can you ration
love, I wonder? Can you dole out a partial body
of affection piece by piece: lips-teeth-tip-of-the-tongue?
My affection for you does not waver. When time is spare
you still rest your head on my shoulder and hold the shape
of me against your frame as if I were an heirloom rifle

waiting to be cradled and fired. I never liked to rifle
through the past for very long. I was able to ration
my expectations and wait with you, plan with you. The body
of our experience rests softly in the crease of my tongue.
In the beginning, I could tell your limbs were lonely and spare
so I lifted you off the page like a detail or a shape

from my favorite painting. Love can re-shape
hearts with fast fury, leaving lovers unattended to rifle
with happiness - a commodity impossible to ration.
Eventually, we learned to find strength in the subjective body
of coincidence and the void that flickers at the back of the tongue.
The void houses my snakebite dreams and the spare

rib in the dirt. Bones and marrow and other spare
parts of some divine idea nestle there in the mud, a shape-
less attempt at a beginning. It's like the world's rifle
is cocked and loaded and love is the only thing left to ration
out salvation. You know how to calm my body
down like an antidote placed on the tongue.

Our story rolls off my tongue and anything I have to spare
is yours. I am determined to shape the world that rifles
through me - to ration out hope as if it were born of no body.

The First Year

Last year at this time I was still in my dress (I kinda wanted to put it on today but it's stashed away in a box in storage) mingling with family and friends in downtown St. Paul. What a wonderful day it was!

One of the first trips Rick and I took together was spring break 2006 to Tucson, AZ. I took this picture of him on a hike up in the mountains surrounding the city. I can remember how incredibly happy I was to be sharing new experiences with him. Today, nearly 5 1/2 years later and with one year of marriage under our belt, I can say that I am one lucky girl and I love him so so much!

Snapshots

Nothing like family meals on a sunny afternoon at the lake.

My first completed baby blanket for a friend. I guess I got the knitting gene.

Grandma Ruth at Kabekona on her birthday. I love her expression.

Rest and Recreation

The windows were open all night.

This morning the cool air curled up next to me in bed. I dozed, remembering that I am off for the next week. My mind quickly wandered to thoughts about what to pack, briefly concerning myself with the weather and the way the lake will look in the afternoon. The leaf shuffle outside finally got me out of bed and now the day is stretched out ahead of me like two lane traffic.

Stop and go, stop and go.

Wherever it is that we're going, dear, we're getting closer.

scraps & strays

*
the implied volume of limbs
shifts the air in gestures and gusts
and i lust for random acts
that love can only touch.

*
darkness as a familiar face,
someone i smile at in the hall-
way and awkwardly eat with
when no else is around.

*
the earth: a giant, a board, a circuit.

*
you held my waist
but i surged ahead of you ---
a love-sick spring in my step.

*
so love me love my words, my song.

*

Pivotal Prairie Moment

This afternoon at work I was looking up bizarre holidays to put on the schedule for next week (I also actually WORK at my job, don't let this fool you). One of the gems I stumbled upon was "Bad Poetry Day" which brought me back to Mrs. Anderson's fourth grade class and the FIRST poem I ever wrote. At some point during that year our class went on a field trip to a nature reserve - if you've ever been to Iowa you can pretty much visualize what a field trip to the prairie would entail. Our assignment was to bring a notebook and pencil and find a place in the tall grass to sit quietly, observe our surroundings, and write a poem.

Although I don't remember the whole thing, I do remember the first half of my first poem:

As I sit on the prairie

Gazing up at the sky

I see a bird pass

And I feel as if I could fly!


But it's also so nice

With all the insects and birds

Who do their work busily

Without any words.


The poem goes on to talk about sunlight and tall grass and by the end I am waving good-bye from a fluffy white cloud. Oddly enough, that was the pivotal moment when I realized how thrilling (and fairly simple) it was to achieve rhythm with words. My nine-year old self was hooked. Cliche? Sure. But I grew up in Iowa, folks. You do the math.