Shimmerescent friendships

There are some friends we have that form part of our being. They define and comfort and better us in ways that our souls know best. We just float along for the ride...

One such friend wrote a poem about me that I had to share. It's excellent and defines the way we know each other. She rocks. Real friends, so few and far between, really make life worth living...

Holli seems like she is chocolate brown dotted about with silver feathers yet her heart beats poor man’s cloth

Holli seems like she is air-conditioned monster car yet her shoes are pink trotro shouting repent

Holli seems like she is red wine and chocolate martinis yet her hair is kasapreko and juice

Holli seems like she is pink and lime green yet underneath she is all the shimmeressent colors of an abalone shell

Old Couple at Heathrow

Here they hover,

Two halves of a common whole

Strangers in their familiarity

Fussing and puttering; shaking

Settling at the table for tea

Together without words to string together

The regretful sagging bond that holds them

Year upon year in the face of inevitability

In the grizzly demise of self and spirit

Crumbs sit dryly on trembling lips

Mingle with the spots of age and the dissolution of vanity

Knobbled fingers grope and balance cups and napkins

Bruised veins betraying fragile surface

Muted mutterings, the fragility within…

But tender their need and knees

Barely touching under the table

Elaborate fans of printed news separating them

The explosion of paper’s bends and crackles

The only sound

But the communication is deeper
Disturbing
Defined.

Grief is eternal but love is stronger

Today is a tough day. I sit at my desk, busying myself with the unimportant, while the undercurrent within me threatens to surge, up through my pounding heart,through my tight throat that fights back with jolted swallows - all the way up into my face, overflowing - my eyes, the tiny openings through which all the feelings will brim over.

Tomorrow marks exactly three years since Shiloh left us. Since I have not held his warm hand or fallen into the warm dark pool of his shining eyes. Of course it is unfathomable not to have my son here with me. It is the stuff of nightmares, and horror films pale in comparison. To even put in black and white the word 'death' - it is so difficult. So very unnatural.

So the only way to approach the reality that faces me is to remember. To celebrate the short time we had. To laugh and smile and hug those who are still here. We all miss him. We all will remember. Always.

I've dragged out an old poem because it is my best tribute to my amazing Shiloh.


For Shiloh

If you were a farmer you’d plant pumpkins

Huge orange nuclear blast pumpkins!

If you were a singer you would wear a white suit and carry a shiny ebony walking stick

You’d have a purple satin handkerchief in your pocket on display

And you’d wear a fedora to match the suit

You would tip the hat forward and wink at all the ladies as you took over the stage…

If you were a bird you would soar higher than happiness

And deeper than 6 oceans

You would grace the sky of my mind with indigo paint brush wings

Touch my cheek so briefly and float on past

Making speed look like a breeze

If you were pink candy floss

You would melt and still be crunchy in my teeth

Fresh and warm and comforting

But you would disappear if I tried to hold you

On my tongue

I would be left with the remnants of u

You cannot be held

You are more than man and mountains below u are small

Though I can’t see u

I feel your red sports car energy

With a yellow lightning stripe down your soul that can only be glimpsed as you

Pass in an instant...

For Quinci

If you were a fish
You would be a doctor fish
Protected by gorgeous turquoise scales
Opalescence reflecting
Deflecting everyone from your secret world
Within

If you were brown you would
Be smooth and varied and steady
As chocolate
Hardwood
And the mild earth itself
You would remember each footstep
That crossed your path

If you were memory itself
You would be immaculate in your intricacy
Not missing a single detail

But you are trapped in our mortal world
That topples you
My delicate one
The mundane routines
Banal in their irrelevance to you

Earth water and sky
The things that preoccupy you

Yet your skin your feet must walk
And carry you through…

If you were a bird
You would be an owl
You would perch above it all
your all seeing eyes
smiling at me and shrugging at the world.