Safety Gone

Any school shooting is a tragedy
but today's at Albemarle High School
in North Carolina is especially
heart-breaking to me; it is my
mother's alma mater, and I have
lots of family in the area. I wonder
how long it will be before Kellie Pickler
is brought up? The country star
hails from there as well.

You should be safe at home.
You should be safe at school.
Between one and the other, awful things
occur and far too often, but at home...
when a child's at home....it should be
better. When a child's at school. There
should be peace, and love, there should
be affirmation, comfort, care, instructing
in the ways wherein the child should go.
Whether in the inner city or in rural
towns across the land, the children
should be safe at home and school.
Children who are angry, though.
because of home or school or both,
are not the safest playmates to be found.
If only we could tell just who they are
before the buttons pushed can't be unpushed,
the shots unfired, the stab wounds taken back.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Old Chicks

I saw the Art Linkletter program
"Kids Say the Darnedest Things"
in the 1960s, which does indeed mean
that to anyone in the 4th grade, I'm old.

When I asked the class to guess
how I was like their teacher
one little girl piped up and said,
without any hesitation,
"You're both old"
which wasn't the answer I was
looking for but is still technically,
at least from her perspective,
correct. Another lesson in
the differences that can occur
between cold hard facts

and truth.

I want to side with truth,
the deeper meanings, explanations,
reasons and intentions, the why
you did that taking on importance
far beyond the what.

Or maybe I just think too much.
Older chicks have a tendency to do that.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Respond

The first responder to a fire or wreck must
readily assess the needs, professionally distant,
clinically adept, without emotions to distract. Not yet,
at least. The crisis past, then those who saved the lives
and saved the day can sit and muse and often (I would think)
begin to weep. Relationships are different, and the same.
Responses are not always what one wants or needs, the little
distances and roadblocks we too often use without awareness,
body language and the like, a certain tone of voice that keeps
relief just out of reach.The best responders here, however,
jump into the fire, embrace the moment, do not waste a second
playing games. Like rain upon a dew-parched leaf, they drink
the actions in, responding naturally, without a thought,
former brittleness not thinking as it moves in supple newness
to give shade to someone else who's been too often in the sun.



(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Cusack Haiku

Brother and sisters John & Joan Cusack

John and Joan Cusack
are believable in movies
when playing siblings.




(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Holding onto News

You'd think that in this day and age a person could
be found at any time, no matter where, but it's not true.
And I am kind of glad of that, although it's inconvenient
when the person I am looking for apparently no longer
has a phone, computer access, address where (I'm told)
the person lives. But when it's I who wants to
disappear a little, off the grid to duck the drama,
breathe some air that doesn't have those waves attached,
I rather like the silent treatment. Not that I'd
abuse the privilege, ignore those needing to leave
word of this or that, but often what another sees
as some emergency, I have found, is not so much.
And in this case, the need to find the person benefits
the person only, and the person really should be calling
me instead, so why should I be bothered that the mail I have
is undelivered, or good news cannot be passed along?



(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

national punc day

no that wasnt a misspelled tribute to thugs and
neerdowells but yesterday was national punctuation day
and i missed it even though i am a word nerd i have even
been accuzed of being a word nazi which was harsh although
ive been known to fuss at friends for misuseing
apostrophes and semicolons i edit facebook
posts when i see the autocorrect made a mistake two
so how could i not know that punctuation has its
own day
how i say
i am so ashamed
an uneditted poem my penance



(c) ellen gillette, 2014

Start

 http://foxy-feet.deviantart.com/art/
Bridge-Toes-177577089

I like the photo,
thinking about someone standing
on a bridge, contemplating
letting go, and then not.

She didn't jump,
but they did.
Officers and EMTs,
adrenaline high mixing
with what's left inside
their coffee cups, exhaust
from cars backed up around
the bridge as she stands crying,
trying to make sense
of everything that's
going on. She can't.
Exhaustion drives her too.
Life got so hard in such
a short amount of time, she's
ill-equipped to handle
it and maybe all
the pain would stop if
she could. Stop, I mean.
Stop thinking. Breathing.
Crying, trying, but the
uniforms won't let her.
Soft voices reason, talking
her away, back from the edge
onto the sidewalk that could
be a half-mile wide, it's solid,
safe, reflecting that they're
thankful they were paying
close attention at that seminar
and now it's here, a crisis
and they knew exactly what
to do. She'll be okay.
The people sitting in their
cars, impatient, wanting
to get home to drama of
their own, hot suppers,
arguments or chilling on
the sofa with their dogs,
some fuming, others praying
for the girl who wants to jump.
And then it's over, officers in
orange vests are waving cars along,
necks crane to catch a glimpse
of who it was that's causing
all the fuss, but she's already on the way
to somewhere with a quiet room
and medication that won't
change a thing unless she
wants it to. They came so quickly,
though, sincere enough they
started to get through to her.
So maybe she could. Start, I mean.
Start thinking, but a different way.
Start living in the present.
And maybe it will work or
maybe she will find another bridge
the next time without people
passing by, but not just yet.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

My husband was stopped from coming home for his dinner break at work last night because traffic was at a standstill due to
a woman threatening to jump off the St. Lucie West Blvd. overpass. Fortunately, it ended well for her.

A Boy I Knew Named Troy

Charmer, older than the others or perhaps
just wiser in some worldly way,
the handsome not-quite-man who fell behind
the class but always seem to lead them, too.
I kept him after school for tutoring but
clearly he was not a fan of extra time
within the confines of a classroom.
One afternoon I sighed so loudly that he looked
up from his papers, saw the sadness on
my face.
"I wish that I could wave a magic
wand and make you want to learn," I said
in answer to the question in those piercing
eyes. He nodded in reply and said, "I wish
that you could, too."
And so the year was spent, him straggling,
not struggling to catch up, just managing to make
it to the end and pass, and that was when
I saw him last.  He's in his thirties now,
I hope still grinning like a movie star,
perhaps he's raising children of his own.
I hope he kisses them at night and waves
a magic wand and tells them that the
magic is in learning, and in love, and maybe
he remembers me and maybe he does not,
Regardless.
I remember him, the revelation that
it wasn't what I said or did, although
the saying and the doing were important.




(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Lone Piano

Stormy Weather was just a song
I sang next to my mother as she played
the piano, no understanding of the ache
a heart can feel when separated from
the one you love, an ache that doesn't
measure distance in miles or inches,
but in memories. A woman's heart may
break, tears falling on the pillow
within reach of someone who once
kissed her tenderly goodnight and now,
back turned to her, hugs a pillow tightly
while ignoring her. A man may lie awake
and stare up at the ceiling trying to
remember how it used to be when they
were more than lovers, when music seemed
always to be playing in the background
of their scenes together, a lone piano
and the voices of a woman, and a child.



(c)  Ellen Gillette, 2014

Back to Normal

There's a let-down when the task is finished,
chairs are put away, the floor is swept of
all the traffic from the celebration. Nothing
out of place to tell you something quite important
is afoot and you are right there in the midst,
a quite important part yourself. It's back to Normal,
or what passes for that state, the unspectacular,
mundane, delightful hours when no one's wond'ring
why you're late or if you thought to pick that
thing up, run that errand they requested. You've got
obligations, yes, a list of things to do before your
head will rest tomorrow night, but at the moment,
all that lies ahead is: hot shower, contacts out,
brush teeth and slip beneath the sheet
and dream of happy thoughts and love.

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Forgotten Task

How it happened doesn't matter,
although I could swear I did the thing that I forgot.
And what it more,  I don't remember the
forgetting, didn't wake up in the night,
that oh-my-God-what-was-I-thinking flash that sends
me scurrying to do the thing that was so
pressing on my mind my brain would not ignore
it, let me sleep. I just forgot. I got so busy,
was distracted by a million things, but really
only one thing, split a million different ways.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

"The Raven" x5

To aptly share about my teaching day that ended wet and drizzly gray
I  mention first that 'cept for one with reading, classes were just English 2 and 3, not 4.
Assignment given, multiplied by five; to read from Lit Book certain poem that, true, I've
never studied much, yet still determined to survive the classes, I taught them something more
about Poe's "Raven" than (confession!) either of us ever knew before.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014


Google, Wikipedia, the Lit Book, plus some notes marked in the margins, took us quite far into Poe's rhyme scheme, imagery, and background. High school rocks.

Current Project

Stacks of tools and tiles

and piles of grout.

Supplies are sitting out

upon the dining table,

Doors are down, of course,

enabling the laying of the

shiny squares of  brown

upon the floor.

Construction dust is everywhere,

the sound of sawcuts fills 

the air. My husband

loves a project! Handy

guy to have around, and

I have hope he will be done

with this one in a week or so,

a little break before he sneaks

the next one in.

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Facebook Fury Haiku

Grrrr. Facebook has locked me
out on the laptop. Poo!
Poo! I say.

I am so angry.
Changed my password, now I'm locked
from my Facebook page.



(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

When Strangers from a Distant Planet Find Each Other

The moment that she realized she must have come
from outer space, her home a dazzling planet
where the standards were so high
she was an exile now,
expelled for less than excellence, evicted
to a mediocre earth of dullish brown
and dullish co-inhabitants all satisfied
to pass the test or keep the job,
get by and don't make waves, behave
yourself but never, ever strive to be the best.
The rest of all she saw wherever she might
find herself, the bar was set so low, it made
her hurt inside, discerning such colossal wastes
of time and energy and talent, for it all was there.
She knew it was. They simply didn't care,
and there was nothing
she could say or do to change that fact.
Banished from one land for failure to
be up to snuff, her punishment
was almost more than she could bear - no
more to try for greatness, awful sentence:
settling for "enough."
What saved her sanity was finding
an expatriate one day all stunned
and out of sorts, deported for (she learned)
her very crime. "Look here," she said,
extending now a tentative, shy hand to
help him up. She was grateful
when he didn't argue, letting her be strong
and capable and sure.
"How is it here?" he asked. "I've heard
it stinks of hell, just slogging through
and never saying what you really think,
and getting used to average, as if "better
than" was just a fairy tale or hypothetical
existence on exotic, distant planets."
"Not at all," she answered with a smile.
"I was lonely for awhile, feeling sad
and puckish and outnumbered,
but then I saw you sitting there. And
now, I think it's grand. Together,
maybe we can start to carve out excellence
that's all our own, and it won't matter
if the only eyes who notice are those on
your face and mine, or if the only voices
marvelling belong to us. In this case, that"
(she thought) "will be enough,"
"But in a good way," he replied,
and she agreed.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Power Prayer

Lazy afternoon
after all the stress
of early on and can
I get this written
before all the power's gone
from my computer?
Wishing for a plug-in
for myself. Oh, right.
That would be you,
the giver of all joy
and inner strength.
I love the avenues through
which the comfort comes,
but sometimes wonder
why you are delayed.
And by the way,
I'd really like some now.
Joy. Power. Healing. Help.
No surge protector needed.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Splinter Allegory

It would have been a silly sight, quite ludicrous
if anyone had seen her, woman in her fifties pretzeled
on the bed complete with readers trying hard to find
the tiny, tiny splinter in her foot. But she was old enough to know that sometimes tiny problems grow
to be disasters, if they're left to fester, swept
beneath the rugs of life, ignored until

the foot must be cut off.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

A friend and I discussed this very morning how unhealthy it is to hold onto grudges, and later, I discovered the splinter, which called to mind the previous conversation.

Gone

Rhett and Scarlett in "Gone with the Wind,"
which celebrates its 75th
anniversary this year.

Three quarters of a century ago,
movie makers had to get permission
from morality police for Rhett to tell the
lovely Scarlett that he (frankly) didn't give a damn.
Epic movies, epic scenes, and scripts that kept
you hanging onto every word that
didn't need a lot of F-bombs to be relevant,
cheap sex to sell the tickets. Classy stories,
leaving more to the imagination, seem so
quaint today. And smoky. Lots of people
smoked onscreen, giving not-so-subtle nods to
all those companies that made their millions
on tobacco. Today the cigarettes are out,
as well as almost everything and everyone
and every situation, graphic detail and FX
that make you feel like you are there in
someone's bedroom, getting shot at in 3-D.
Maybe spending time at Tara would
be pleasant for a change, although the times were
(truth be told) more horrible than anything
I've watched upon the screen of late.
Scarlett's selfishness and pride were nothing
in comparison to all the prejudice and hate, but still,
the film's a classic and Clark Gable's easy on
the eyes, and I remember my delight at
finding out that books are so much better
than the shortened versions, but to see it
all play out in living color, what a treat,
and with a tub of buttered popcorn, even better.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Can of Worms

A can of worms is opened,
wriggling mass of slimy creatures
intertwined and writhing to a melody
our human ears can't hear. The smell
is musty, of the earth, a dank foreboding
rising that might make a person throw
it down, disgusted and repelled. Worms were
not created for a can, however, and once freed,
unfettered from those artificial walls, they quickly
burrow into soil and do their job quite well.
It's true of any can of worms (or most):
a little light at first is not a pleasant thing,
the odor also notwithstanding, but when
things have settled down, there's life
and growth and air between the layers
that is healthier than keeping all that
complication cooped up in a can.

9/11 Haiku

Anniversaries
should always bring glad tidings.
Some bring only tears.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

The Edge of Somewhere I Have Never Been

I got a postcard from the edge of somewhere I have never been, handwritten in
nostalgic scrawl, four words, quite small and neatly centered:
Why are we here? but underneath the question is a statement
filled with pain and doubt: Why am I here, and what accomplishments 
are printed there below my name? And who the hell am I supposed to be?
And if I'm asking, but the answers aren't forthcoming, maybe I should 
make arrangements, meet my Maker face-to-face and ask again, 
when maybe he will not ignore so easily.

We agree to meet when she's returned; I want to comment without sounding
glib, cliche, too trite, too light, as if I judge her suffering (I don't) or find
it so ridiculous, get over it, let's change the subject, order one more round.
She scares me, and she knows it, but she also sees that I won't budge
despite that fact I'm clueless as to how to help, afraid to follow
her so closely that when next she falls into a hole, I might slip into it
along with her; I fear that I'm too weak to pull her out.

And then I think, we've got this. We' are talking about us, the
captains of our destinies and sisters joined by common histories,
a tie that binds us tightly. We can show the scars, but won't.

And if we fell, we/d sit there in the dark and cool, the musty earth
a temporary harbor from the furies of the storms of life
and we would laugh at how our squeals (when something having many legs
dropped right into our laps) were like the squeals our children used to make
when they were playing outside and we sat in shady chairs and listened
as we drank iced tea and talked about the way that it would be when we were old.

And when we'd rested, we would climb. Or I would give a boost (she's tiny)
and she'd scramble out, and find a rope to throw me. Admittedly, I might be
worried that when I made it to the surface, she'd have run, but this I know,
if nothing else: my legs are older, but they're  longer. I could catch up
quickly, well before she'd had the chance to run too far.



(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Not Knowing

There is a man. Not an old man, but his
age is not the issue. More telling is the fact
that he's not young enough to be confused
about his actions, just in case you might have
wondered. He's aware, in other words. Knows
better, didn't do it. And he's smart enough to plan
and plot, to cover tracks, so not a case of mental
illness but there is, most definitely, some sickness there.
His race is quite beside the point, as - really - all the pain
and suffering and economic lack he may have faced
when he was just a boy. If that's the way it was, how sad
for him that he allowed his past to turn and twist him rather
than becoming better, higher, greater than the circumstances
he could not control. Maybe where his heart should be, his joy,
there is a gaping hole because no parents said they loved him.
Maybe he was often hungry, bullied, used or beaten. Perhaps
he lost someone he wanted, cherished greatly, needed. None
of that provides a viable excuse for what he did, what he would
do again if given half a chance. My faith requires that I forgive.
And love. But fiercer love for someone that he hurt requires
that never, ever, will I see the day that I forget. There's something
in me that would welcome something of a face-to-face, a tête-à-tête,
a confrontation with this person, asking all the anguished details
so I have the whole, unvarnished truth, connect the dots and put
each piece where it belongs inside the puzzle. But this meeting
will not happen, though, as I've decided that with some things,
it is healthier and wiser not to know.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Bra in the Branches

This isn't a seagrape, but when
I googled "bra in tree"
I came up with quite 
a few pictures. So
it must have happened
at some point,
by whimsy or design!

A friend was walking down a pathway to the beach
and saw, just out of reach, a piece of clothing dangling
from a seagrape branch as if someone had thrown it
there in haste. A bra, it was, he shared, amazed again
in telling it, with slight embarrassment at mentioning
what he'd been raised to think was clearly un, at least
in such mixed company as ours. Unmentionables like
underwear, or subjects quite taboo to generations past
like S-E-X and what-not, but the story started, he plunged forward and related that he'd had  to jump a little, but he brought it down, a brazen silky black fruit rescued from the elements. He held his breath a moment, listening for the sound of someone making monkey love from further back into the thicket, but he couldn't hear a thing except for muted ocean music and the quickened breath of his exertion and his curiosity.
It seemed unseemly to just leave the item there to sway
with breezes and cause possible alarm to prudish
pathway-goers holding hands with little children who might
glance up, see, and ask too many questions. I have it still,
he said with some chagrin and quoted, then, the cup and number
of its size to all his listeners. That's me! I said, and blushed
a little when I realized I'd blurted it out loud, as I was raised,
like he was, in the South. But bras aren't cheap (not good ones
any how) these days, and it would wash. It's in the wash right now.
And if a woman went back to the pathway hoping to retrieve
her fav'rite bra, I hope she'll laugh to find it gone, and come
up with a story of her own to tell delighted friends.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

No, this didn't happen, not to me anyway. But  like all good stories based in PART on actual events, even if it is as flimsy a connection as hearing someone say they went to the beach, or hearing someone say they found a lost sock, it could have happened this way. And who's to say it hasn't happened to someone, somewhere, sometime?

Fine Line

That line between the orchestrating of events
to get a certain action or result, and letting life
unfold at its own glacial pace while (sometimes)
awful things transpire you might have kept
from happening if only you had taken steps before...
too fine to see with eyes this weak. My hearing's
not that great, apparently, because I am asking:
What to do? Who to call for help, or do not call
at all, because it's not as bad as it will get, not yet.
Perhaps the answer's in the silence. There is
nothing to be done, so all of heaven waits. Hushed.
Ready to step in when human effort finds its end.
I may not be there, quite. Ideas rage within my mind,
do this, do that, quick, make it happen so that this or that
will finally resolve, but then, if I have made it so,
what benefit is there? What joy? Solutions are
not real or permanent when we step in too soon.
But oh, the balancing, the trickiness of staying
on the wire, the fear that there's no net below.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Serendipitous Saturday

It's one thing to be hard at work from dawn till dusk,
so tired you fall into bed and don't get up until the sun
can join you. And you didn't get to all the things you
thought you'd do, before you dropped, exhausted,
off to sleep. It's quite another when the day was filled
with pleasant serendipities and seeing friends and finding
someone's Christmas present early and the beach and
so much peace and calm that by the time you drifted
off to sleep, or were about to, and you thought of something
you'd forgotten to accomplish, it was just too late. A surplus
of sweet memories. How often do such days occur?


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Drought

The fact that there is thirst

proves there is water, somewhere,

even if it's out of reach and we're

surrounded by hot seas of shifting sands. 

The hope of water cannot moisten

cracked and swollen lips or quench 

the aching need and longing for its 

sustenance, the miracle of liquid 

nourishment our very cells and skin

and stomach cry for, cry for loudly. 

But just knowing that provision has 

been made, if only we can find it, 

a supply for all demands, regardless 

if it's unattainable this very second,

is a respite in itself. There's something 

to that knowledge, the assurance that today, 

a spring might open up before our very eyes,

a meteor could fall from heaven, split a rock 

nearby and from it flow cool waters of relief.

We've heard that it has happened.

The report was from a trusted source.

Who says a cloud will never burst

above us, blessed torrent falling down

upon us as we stand receiving, 

open-mouthed and laughing in the rain?

(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Helping Those Who Yell

Helping someone out who yells back in response
is not the best thing that could happen in a day,
but neither is it (my opinion) quite the worst.
The person still was helped, so that is good.
I didn't yell at her, and that is also good.
If asked for help again, however, I may well
just hesitate at first. I may. At least...I should.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

The Underside of Rocks

The rock in my poem was supposed
to be a metaphor, but while
looking for a graphic I discovered
that there is actually an
International Rock Flipping Day,
and it's almost here.
Flip a rock on Sept. 9.

It was a fine rock, smooth gray and free of lichen
or sharp edges that might rip their jeans or scar
sun-freckled skin. The boys would sit upon it,
talking, arguing the selling points of songs,
discussing all the silly rules their parents stayed
awake at night devising, mocking drama queens
or wondering out loud what makes a person's farts
not smell so bad to them. They sat there on the
rock beside the pond and fished, the sun so hot
the unseen crickets kept their song alive all day.
But also lurking unseen were all types of pestilence
beneath the rock, the kind that have no eyes because
they love the darkness, crawly things with lots of legs
that reek when they are squished. They'd squeal like girls, the boys upon the rock, if they once lifted it and saw the underside. They'd be afraid at first, but one brave lad would laugh and say come here, it's just some bugs. We're bigger, stronger.
We can feed them to the fish as bait.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Silly Proverb

Whoever said a watched pot never boils
went to a lot of trouble to explain a lie.
If you heat a liquid to the right degree it
bubbles every time, so standing there
impatiently and fretting that it's taking
far too long will never change the law.
Some things just are and always will be,
whether you agree with them or not,
or like them, or find fault at how things
move along, and or wish for quicker speed.


(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014

Can Wait

The song was joyful, tempo fast with lots
of voices, instruments in perfect sync, a
tambourine providing back beat to the swaying
of a choir I could envision, black smiling faces
with perhaps a smattering of whites who knew the
difference in clapping on the second/fourth
instead of on the first and third, perfect pitch
and so enthusiastic that you have to jump up
to your feet and shout, but as I listened
to the words again I thought that I would not
be honest if I sang them.
"I just can't wait", it went,
alluding to the Lord's return. Confession time:
I can.
Wait, I mean.
It's fine with me if he waits 50 years or more,
another 1000. I don't care. I guess I should,
but there you go, I don't. I'd like to see
my friends and family come to know him, have
their destinations after death assured. I'd like to see
a headline that the final tribe somewhere in the
Pacific or buried deep within the Amazon's dense
shoreline has fin'lly heard the Gospel and it
has a Bible in its language and I'd like to see the
multitudes come to the Lord, as prophesied before
the end of everything we know, but frankly, I've
got so much on my mind within my tiny little world,
it's almost more than I can muster to remember
that across the globe there's war, beheadings,
martyrs dying and they wonder when, sweet Jesus,
will it end? If that's not Tribulation, I don't
know what is. My own is trivial, compared to theirs,
but mine is here. My dreams are here, not somewhere
there by Jordan's shores, not singing for the chariot
to swing low, come and take me home, don't want
to go. Not yet. It doesn't matter, I suppose. He'll
come for me exactly when he wants to. And he'll
come the final time according to a plan of man
or church's proclamation...not. And if I'm shallow,
or unfeeling, or not spiritual enough because I hope
that he delays and tarries, giving me a chance to
see some of the things I want to see accomplished
in my life, I know that he, at least, will understand.
The dreams, I think, he gave me.
They. Are. Grand.




(c) Ellen Gillette, 2014