Balcony People

Balcony people stand above, waving, grinning ear to ear, as my parade goes by,
cheering, silly little victory dances, as pleased with my success as if it was their own.
In a way it is. How many of us would take the risks, do the work,
sweat out the blood and tears it takes to create something grand and meaningful
or take the plunge and enter icy water, dying to one dream so we can
rise, gasping for air and warmth, ready for resurrection...
without those gentle pushes from them, those "You can do it"s? I couldn't. I need them.
Even better, when one climbs down to join me, riding on the back of a convertible,
taking it all in with me, laughing at the kids and their balloons who line the sidewalk as we pass.

Without them, all we'd have left would be the snarky lot in the basement,
moaning, groaning, pulling us by the ankles as we try to take the stairs
before we're sucked down to their level, chained to a post, and not allowed to
see the sunlight again. Maybe they never had balcony people, or didn't recognize
them when they tried to lend a hand or cheer them up. I feel for them, really, I do.
But. The sun is shining too brightly for me now. My eyes would never adjust to the dark.
They've learned to feel their way around, but I need the light.
I need your cheer.

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Symbiosis

Greek syn, (not “ugly as homemade”)

bonds with bios.

No longer simply with, or solitary life,

but merged into life with,

creative connectedness congenial

to both parties involved.

Thus, sightless shrimp invites the goby

into his watery nest, his guest a light enough sleeper

to warn of approaching predator.

Accordant clownfish and anemone

exchange light housekeeping on an ocean reef

for cozy quarters with a spectacular view.

Oxpecker pecks on rhinosaurus

since lice are nice enough to eat (if that's your thing)

but not so nice, I think, when eaten by.

Sighing siboglinid tube worms keep

certain bacteria happy in hot water so both 

can grow and gross us out another day.

Of all such pairs in nature, though, none is so fun

as the coveted codependency

of grandmother teaching and tickling little boy

who, in return, tickles and teaches her.

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Okay, I'm cheating here, giving myself a break by posting something I'd written before...but new to almost everyone on the planet! 

Path

They stood in front of us
holding hands, stumbling over vows,
giving their lives away
as if they had a clue what their
lives would be, who they would be,
a dozen years hence,
thirty, more. They'd change.
Grow. Grow up, maybe. Grow apart,
drift a little further away from each
other on the path of life.
And maybe love would keep up with them
and maybe not. Love might
stub its toe on a rock, or need to catch
its breath, and there they'd go, walking off
into the sunset. When they'd
stop and look back, they'd wonder
where love was. Too late to go
back and find it in the dark. The road
had plenty of pitfalls while
it was day--they'd never make it now. 
Not without injury.
Better to rest a bit. Wait until morning,
after a tasty breakfast, wiping
the sleep from their eyes.
They'd find the view less rosy than 
the day before, but still, the road would
seem fine, just fine. They couldn't see the fork
ahead just yet. Love might show up 
in time to guide them in the same 
direction, or it might not. Two people let in
enough distance between them,
they just naturally follow separate roads
that may lead to even better
destinations than the one they planned
and promised years ago. Up to them, I suppose.
Too late to warn them now, to tell them
to keep holding hands with love from the start.
To not let it get out of sight. To wait for it,
if need be. We've been down the road
ourselves. We could have warned them 
over cake and champagne but they wouldn't
have heard us. The music was too loud,
and you were snacking at the buffet table
while I twirled, dancing the night away.

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

I can't begin to explain this. I was thinking about marriage and planning to go in one direction when I took a fork in the road myself! Sometimes the words write themselves the way they want to be written.  I was surprised by the sadness and wanted to tell the young couple to go right or left, but go together...but that's none of my business, now, is it?

Morning Call

Gone, the days of simple calls
answered by people trained in
etiquette. HIPAA rules the
air waves now, not common sense.
Power Of Attorney
with documents in hand, DURABLE,
for that matter, sounds solid enough,
should count for something. All
the numbers that my parents
have become, policy, social,
at the ready. Numbers aren't
enough, a somewhat
testy voice assures me. I should've
told him I WAS my mother. According
to the attorney, in matters of decision,
I am. I am my father, which would sound
more convincing if I had Darth Vader's
mask. This guy's not buying the P.O.A.
Maybe he had a fight with the wife last night.
Maybe he has no wife.
Or, to be more politically correct,
maybe he has no husband. Whatever.
I'm in search of an amount, that's all,
money to to send this guy so their
lives will still be insured. He can't tell
me a thing. Not without my documents
in HIS hand. Faxed or mailed.
"I'm surprised," I say, "that you
don't have email capability."
I can be testy too.
If a fax is fine, why not an emailed scan?
That would be easy. That
would be convenient. That
would not require driving
to another location. So screw it.
I'll make copies and
trust the U.S. Mail to take it from there.
They can wait. It's just money
I'm trying to send. TO THEM.
I should have waited to call
until after I made the coffee.

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

One Reason Why Helping God is Rarely a Good Idea

When Hagar and son Ishmael got
kicked out, it didn't set well
with either of them...or with God, for
that matter. The kids of the two sons
of Abraham haven't played well
together ever since.

When God told Abe he'd sire a son

(despite his wife's old age)

Sarah laughed and thought it best

to help God set the stage.

She drug her maid to Abe's own tent

and offered her, a gift.

If only she hadn't tried to help

perhaps there'd be no rift.

For later, on romantic whim

perhaps with much to drink,

the old couple once again made love.

Now the Mideast's on the brink

of disaster as it's often been

since Ish and Zack were born.

One lesson here, amidst so many:

beware the woman scorned!

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Complete change of direction, both in subject matter and rhyme. Tropical Storm Isaac got me thinking, and with the upcoming elections and the importance (in my opinion) of standing with Israel...well. Here 'tis.

Significant Loss

They say that any Significant Loss
changes you.
For the rest of your life
you figure out who you are Now.
Twelves years later,
the anniversary of the funeral,
I'd do things differently.
The service, for one thing. 
The man who read my words would
play no part at all.  And
I'd stand my ground beside
the final resting place - fancy word
for hole - until the last bit of dirt
had settled. Men in suits with fancy cars
would not coerce me into leaving 
one second before I chose. The people
eating casseroles waiting for The Family
could wait. Adam was there. 
His body, anyway.
I loved it, too.
The woman who pulled me aside,
hand warm on my icy arm, said
she'd always Be There for me.
I'd stop the lie before it could escape
her lips. "Live your life," I'd say. 
"Hug your kids. Remember us in prayer, 
if we come to mind, but make no promises
you will not keep. Make no
promises at all, in fact. You don't
know what tomorrow brings. 
You don't know how you will change."
Or maybe I'd let her talk, after all.
Not one word in twelve years,
but surely she meant it at the time.
That should count for something.

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

So much could be said about the day of Adam's funeral. Too much for one poem, or a year of poems. I settled this week into a holding pattern, like a storm that moves in and then drenches the ground for days. Eventually it stops, things dry, the sun returns. 

Visitation

When we told the funeral home how many hours to set
for the visitation, he said "That will be brutal." He knew
it would take its toll, but we knew
to expect a crowd.
Paying respects, saying goodbye.
Flowers, so many flowers. It would be months
before the smell didn't usher in a meltdown.
I'd never liked open caskets but relented.
Any chance to see that face, as long as possible.
T-shirt and shorts, cap turned around
the way he liked to wear it. They had to trim the bill
so it laid right. Barefoot. Didn't own a suit,
or live long enough to rent one, even, for prom.
Tongue ring out of sight but still intact
through accident, surgeries, this final
affront. The smile wasn't right,
but there was no mistaking the shell for the boy
we missed. Miss.
Teenage girls in short skirts, unnoticed for once
by boys bravely trying to hold it together.
They brought things to bury with their fallen friend,
treasures a sign of the treasure he was:
notes, a ring. His All-Star pitcher's dad brought
a game ball to tuck beside him.
"Chris couldn't come," he whispered,
tears streaming. "He just couldn't."
In a few years, Chris would join his catcher,
and their coach.
Our turn to visit grieving parents,
tell them it won't get better.
But we get better at it.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Aftermath

Strange days between death and burial. 
Too much time.
Too much space in the room.
At the funeral home, David's former classmate will make 
The Arrangements So much sadness in that little phrase.
Coffin-shopping, absurd! Moody (to say the least) 
I know which one we'll pick, without even looking, 
the cheapest one they have.
No regrets or guilt, nothing to prove. Still, 
I'm pleased when I see it. Simple pewter, it suits him.
(As if a metal box can suit.) 
Tiny plot of ground to buy next. David's laid off, real estate's high,
even here. Location is everything. 
Youngest brother will take care of it; he's like that. 
(Years ago, kids small, David's chest hurt, the ambulance came.
An infection, but a nasty one. People called:
"Let us know if you need anything." 
Who has time to make a list with toddlers underfoot,
worrying I'd be a young widow, like someone once said?
Brother-in-law came, announced he was mowing the yard.
He's like that. Still.)
We return to our house with too much space
to find mountains of food, brought not
so that I don't have to cook, but so that we'll remember to eat. 
Smells and tastes comfort, but it really is the thought
that counts. 
Sleep fails. I get up in the dark,
cleaning house with a vengeance, 
write words for someone else to say two day's hence. 
The weather man predicts a storm could interrupt
our carefully constructed Arrangements but 
I know it won't. I'm sure of it.
God took our son. 
He owes us that much.




(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012.

Secret Kiss

Somewhere else, happy families are getting the word about successful surgeries.
Arnold and Charles will never need dialysis again. The machine keeping Chuck alive is gone;
Adam's perfect heart, securely installed. A lung means Sharon can function as a mom again, 
Eleanor's new liver means she'll see her family grow and lose her precious grandson, 
and feel some of our present pain. Darrell and Frances will see again.
The miracle so many people prayed for, answered seven-fold. Were they not specific?
Did they forget to say a certain word? But no. It doesn't work that way.

He fills up the gurney. When did he get so tall? As handsome in death as - no.
His grin made the difference, tying sparkle of eye and freckle of cheek
into one wonderful event. The next few days will be a blur - coffin to pick out,
funeral to plan, final resting place to choose beneath an oak tree on which a friend of his will
carve A.G. RIP. People we don't even know will leave things, trinkets and letters, tangible
proof they remember, sacred offerings that will fade in twelve years, be blown away, 
some of them. We'll hang a windchime, accompaniment for tears. 

But first, longest night over, we stretch awake on waiting room chairs pushed together.
Follow someone down a hall. There's just three of us in the room with him. Not him. 
The beautiful thing that contained his contagious spirit. Absent spare parts no longer needed. 
Most people just go home, they told us, but we needed this. Parents, little sister.
One last chance to see him, machines gone. deceptive rise and fall of chest silent. Just Adam. 
See his shell and say goodbye. Kiss to forehead, forever-closed eyelids, nose, cheeks, chin, lips. 
Our secret kiss since he was a baby. Last child. My baby.  He will always be that.

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Last Day

A brain can only take so much, and Adam's had not coped well 
with the trauma. Things were done, things better left unsaid.
The miracle must be now, if there was to be one. 
We whispered in his ear sweet words, told him to come back, wake up. 
If he could. If he wanted to.

Cords and cables detached, lifelines loosened.

We held our breath, waiting for his to begin.
Our hearts stopped, hoping his would beat, but no.
They did the test twice, just to make sure.
Another one, down the hall, to check for brain activity, even a glimmer. Nothing.
People trickled back and forth to say goodbye, left. We didn't.
You could see it on their faces. They'd been so sure, some of them,
that Adam would leave the hospital, that God would hear.
When the miracle came, it was packaged differently, 
addressed to someone else.
His body wasn't done quite yet, you see. 
Papers were signed. Phone calls made.
Cords and cables hooked back up. 
Chest rose and fell again, as if alive.
Heartbeat's solemn dance across the screen 
but I was there, I could see the change. System down. Nobody home.
Busy people collected measurements and readings, 
connected with hospitals across the state.  
Time for different doctors. Helicopters came and went, 
precious cargo in Igloo coolers. My precious, now theirs.
Since childhood, his fireman's dream of saving lives,
finally came true.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Waiting Haiku

Long bedside vigil. 
Monitor beeps, machine breathes. 
Is he even there?










(c)Ellen Gillette, 2012

Twelve years ago, we still hoped for a miracle, a healing or resurrection, whatever was needed to restore Adam to us. For a long time after, I had a hard time going to the hospital for any reason, hearing those sounds. It would all come back, like a flood.

Ford Explorer

This book deals with the Firestone tire fiasco with Ford,
but many Explorer accidents were due more to its
pre-2002 unsafe design.

Everyone has a fantasy.
Mine is winning a brand new Explorer,
shining, beautiful, gleaming in the sunlight,
and beating it beyond recognition
with a sledgehammer. Someone would
post it on YouTube and I could tell the world
in one fell swoop what I think of Ford.

I dream of being rich enough to
to buy up all the old ones, before 2002
at least, every single one an accident
waiting to happen. My price would be
fair, more than, so no one 
would turn me down.

Design flaws abound.
Ford knew it, knows it still.
"Acceptable collateral damage."
How do they sleep at night?

Changes made,
too late to save my son's life.
Many lives.
Profit vs. people. 
They've never come clean,
not even after the crashes started. 
Winning a few lawsuits hardened their hearts. 
My heart is hard too.

Cold day in hell before I drive one. I'd rather walk. 
If they'd just say they fucked up,
that they're sorry. Something.

I should have seen the research, asked more questions.
Should've made him wait, not made it happen.
Dream car, he'd pay me back
a little each month. "Should'ves"  crush
like the hood of an Explorer rolling over
and over in the wee hours of the morning.

Official story: driver lost control. Vehicle rolled.
Driver ejected, suffered head trauma. 
Not speeding, not drinking, bent down
to scratch his leg or change a CD,
ill-fated design kicking in with a vengeance.
Where is mine? I sent Ford his photo,
no response to that stellar smile. 
Maybe the CEO tossed it into a drawer
with the rest, stuffed full of fallen Fords,
a list of outraged mothers and fathers,
husbands and wives. They'll be wary
of them if they're smart.

I like to think he died, and then the accident,
God calling him to heaven. The Explorer,
driverless, out of control, ejecting his already
lifeless body for us to fret over
for days, while he partied in eternity.
No panic, no impact save that on our lives.
Much more preferable than the alternative: 
I bought the car that caused his death.
My signature sealed his fate.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Yes, I know that God's ways are higher than ours and that he can do whatever the hell he wants to do without having our permission or approval. Ford couldn't do anything God didn't allow. He either allowed it or caused it. He certainly could have prevented it at many steps along the way. Blah, blah, blah. Don't get your knickers in a twist. I am allowed to vent and rage and cry and accuse and tell God I hate him, as I did one day at Adam's grave. Immediately I heard that still, small voice I know and trust despite everything: "Yes, but you love me too." God can handle my anger and understands my grief. If you can't, that's okay. Just keep it to yourself, please. I can't reach Ford, but I might just reach you!

The Week Begins

Adam Rogers Gillette
born: 5/22/1984
died: 8/22/2000
remembered with love: always

Seven days in a week, fifty-two weeks in a year.
Just one week, though, I dread,
its dates, events so entwined with my thoughts 
and beating of my heart, that nothing, no one can
pry me loose. Not that I want to be free.
I need to feel this week, breathe it in,
roll around in it until the smell is mashed into every pore, 
because it's not the stench of death that reeks this week 
and every week but the fragrance of his life, so sweet.
This week each year the loss is harder to keep at arm's length,
harder to let it rest just under the surface of my skin.
The goneness hovers, a grey, pulsating cloud building up
slowly until its weight of tears have no more room.
This week, the forecast's always different. This day. 
The last day we saw him alive. It visits annually,
taking all the air out of the room. It struts 
the way he strutted smiling into my room that day,
found me on the bed rehearsing for a silly part in a silly play,
plopped down beside me, took the book, fed me cues.
He left early for work. An errand.
If I hadn't sent him on the errand, I would've had an hour more,
maybe. He left the house and never came home again.
Worked the  job he loved, took a guy home to change,
dropped him somewhere else, started the drive home.
Almost made it. But that particular sorrow follows today's.
Today's is enough: twelve years ago,
twelve years ago exactly, when I hugged him goodbye
when I hugged him goodbye, I could have hugged him longer.
I could have heard him laugh 
one 
more 
time.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Yes, it will be that kind of week. The real week, in 2000, I was surprised  to see the sun shining, or people smiling. It felt like the universe should stand still to mark Adam's passing, and maybe it did. Maybe we were just too sad to notice. One thing is certain, however: if it paused, it was only for a breath, followed by a celebration our eyes haven't been trained to see, one our ears can hear only faintly and at special times. Life does go on, and in the last two years...yep, not until then...a seed of pure and lasting joy that God promised to plant when Adam died, has finally taken root, gotten enough sun and water, and is growing, growing, growing. 

Pancakes Need Heat

Some batters are tasty before they are cooked:
brownie, cake. Not so the pancake variety.
Pancakes need heat.
They demand attention.
It takes finesse to flip them just so.
Walk off and leave them,
they dry up until no amount of
syrup will make it right.
As to shape, perfect circles look nice
but the strange knobby ones
taste just as good. Short stack or
a mountain, depending on your appetite.
Add berries or nuts or chocolate chips
once in awhile for variety, but your basic,
unadulterated pancake never 
loses its appeal.
Fancy up a pancake
with powdered sugar, or
strawberries and whipped cream,
but rolled up right with butter inside
is just as good, just testing to see
if this batch is good. It always is.
The only way to ruin pancakes
is to ignore them.
Women can be like that, too.




(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Lemons, No. 1

"When life hands you a lemon, 
make lemonade."
That's what they say,  
perkypeople, the folks at Hallmark, 
people with no frame of reference
who should keep their tight lips closed.
Make lemonade? Screw that.
When life hands you a lemon,
devour the sour and spit out the seeds.
Let it turn your mouth inside out
and bring tears to your eyes. 
Embrace it with teeth and taste buds, 
conquer it, suck in every last drop.
Make lemonade on your own terms,
when you choose to,
according to a secret recipe
you share with no one else
unless you want to.
You don't have to play the perky game
or obey the folks at Hallmark.
You own the lemon.
It doesn't own you.



(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Baby Girl

I thought she'd be a second son.

A great smile, seriously.

In my husband's family,

that was all his brothers had had

up until that point.

But there she was, smaller than her

big brother at birth, but healthy. I had too many

blue onesies, not enough 

pink. I made curtains for her room,

matching dust ruffle for the crib. She learned

to pump her legs on the swingset before

her brother. Bittersweet smile, though.

Wasn't much of a warning, but 

maybe we just weren't paying attention.

That day at church, she sat on my lap 

clapping to the music. Her hands weren't flat.

Complaints about the stairs, I'd chalked up 

to five-year-old silliness. No. 

Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis. Not silly at all.

For 28 years she's lived with it 

(we've lived with it, too)

not one of the lucky ones to outgrow it.

Pain, her companion, pain

meds her best friend. She's

learning to live without the

drugs that did more harm than good.

Not the pain. 

The pain is always there. 

In her teens, the photographer said,

"That's the best smile in the whole school!"

I was there and she lit up the room in response.

I need to see that smile again. I know

it's still there, under the stress,

the wishful thinking, the why-me's.

Under the pain. It's still there, baby girl.

Prodded, poked, pricked by needles,

x-rayed, injected, made fun of, misunderstood,

exercised. Bad choices along the way,

but who hasn't made those?

She's forgotten how to smile

at times. Forgotten who cares. 

Forgotten to care.

Her first meds were baby aspirin,

mixed with Coke. Gold, names too long to spell, 

prayer, experimental measures,

remission that lulled us to sleep before we

woke one morning

to find it all crashing back into our lives.

A woman now, with children of her own.

Trying to regroup, focus, step out of

her comfort zone, but when you're 

uncomfortable every single second

it's hard to do. Tough love from us, 

sometimes. It's still love, though. 

You've got to know that. 

It's still love.

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

Our daughter Terri turns 33 today and may or may not appreciate having a poem about her posted so publicly! But we're proud of her for living with challenges most people can't fathom, for making some healthy, positive lifestyle changes for her own sake, for that of her children. Happy birthday!

On-the-Job Training

"Study to be a nurse online" -
my spam folder promises a career! 
Success! But
some things can't be learned by reading
screen or book.
Driving a car. Becoming a chef.
Applying make-up. Making love.
You can read a dozen marriage books
before the wedding, but nothing
prepares you for
the day after or every day after that
but OJT. No manual can explain
a man's meanimg when he says that
or why her silence is a reflection
of sadness no one shares.
How-to brochures with
tons of tidy parenting tips,
techniques for the terrible twos,
the terrible-er teens,
but I defy any parent to breeze
through without a lot of blood,
sweat, and tears. Or other bands.
Play the music loud enough and
kids amuse themselves
until you figure out your next move.
Grief cannot be learned by study,
nor love. 
"Study to be a nurse" if
you wish; it isn't how you'll learn.
Even learning is not living it out,
every day, when patients reek
of disease and you fight to keep
from showing it on your face.
Or someone's child lies dying
and you can't stop it
from happening.


(c)Ellen Gillette, 2012

My mother went to nursing school back when only single women were nurses. She quit, thinking she'd be getting married soon and always regretted it. I have friends who are nurses and a daughter about to begin nursing school. Like teachers, they are overworked and underpaid, but what a ministry. The idea that an online course could even come close to training nurses struck me as absurd.

Found Money

If the mother had gotten her out of bed earlier
and shown her the grandmother's note.
If she had gotten right to the task
after she answered the phone and
talked to the grandmother, and
listened to what her mother told her
in the background.
If she had begun vacuuming before
the grandmother got home.
If, if, if.
Then she would have found a tightly 
folded twenty-dollar-bill
on the floor of the grandmother's room where
it had fallen by mistake, unseen,
and perhaps been tempted
to stick it in her pocket without a word
to anyone. No one would have known.
As it was,
she was not tempted to do anything but
sleep a little longer and
do what she wanted to do
before she did her chores, which she most
definitely did not.
And maybe talk back, but only a little.
She still had to vacuum but now
the grandmother was there to make sure
it was done properly, and to tell her
she was doing well, and offer suggestions
on how to accomplish more in less time,
and to teach the little brother how to
mop the floor behind her work.
She could have taken the twenty-dollar-bill,
but she did a good job, and so did her little
brother (surprising everyone by
volunteering for the job).  Now, the 
grandmother is thinking that tonight
the family should all go out to eat.
She found a twenty-dollar-bill on her floor
and has no idea from whence it came.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2012

My mother calls money like this "found money."  Historically, in her opinion, it should always be used for something extra or special, not responsibly tucked away to pay for bills.

D Men

Some men I know,
recently divorced.
Once committed,
now available, they could be
back in the saddle
like Sleepless in Seattle
but something hold them back.
The freedom surprises, appalls.
Getting a feel for
the temperature of a sunlit sea
in which so many fish swim
it makes their heads swim too.
Graying men stunned into
surreal existence.
"What we have here is failure
to communicate."
They wait 
for something to happen, 
someone to happen by.
It doesn't work that way.
It never worked that way.
Have they not learned anything?
Do they know how many
of their brothers, if they're honest,
wish they could trade places?
The excitement of a new chapter,
fresh start, no end to perky analogies
and they leave the book
unopened on the bedside table.
Sadness, for now
their only lovers.
Younger men, pride hurt
and kids to consider,
will find companionship 
before the ink is dry.



(c) Ellen Gillette,2012