The Tomato-coloured Couch 6:11pm
I am alone in My House
sitting before My 3-dimensional Flame
of glass, lit with a tea light
deep in Its Centre
like The Centre of Me
bright with caution
The Tomato-coloured Couch 8:20pm
Within The Cauldron Of The Sun
Countless Stars Are Born
To Live Upon The Earth
Within Their Hazards
And Their Glory
–
We Live These Lives
Knowing Or Not Our Destinies
Until We Funnel Back In
Into The Sun Again
Leaving Our Shadows
Over This Eternal Playground
The Hawk Corner Room 3:30pm
I wear An Open Heart Watch
on My Right Arm
A Silver Band on My Left
My Question Mark Ring
I deliberately flashed
when I last saw Him
nodding
over The Bed of My X
Father-in-law
3:50pm
I plunge into My Day Dream
snug in Eliza’s Corner Room
with a cup of Earl Grey
in front of The Picture Window
framing The Reason
I am Here
The Hawk Living Room 3:11pm
Guess how old I was
when I engaged
in the following activities:
–
Tearing into strips
the striped vinyl cover
to My Dollies’ changing table
& wadding the shreds
up in My Fists
to stuff in My Mother’s
waste paper basket
–
Clutching Two Hundred Wedding Photos
to My Chest & throwing Them
One By One
to The Night
along the ample length
of water frontage
in the Town of Shelburne
–
Emptying The Entire Contents
of My Second Husband’s Brief Case
cradling The Papers in My Arms
casting Them aside
Piece By Piece
into The Twilight
along one mile of old rail road track
through Barrington Passage
–
On a clear day in June
Shredding Five Known Copies
of My Own Manuscript
So Long Sam
taking seven hours
consuming as many beers
& putting Three Bags Full
out by the side of the road
The Hawk Kitchen 8:52am
The Blue-grey Clouds
sitting low
over The Slate-grey Ocean
are My Call
to drink
from The Horizon
The Tomato-coloured Couch 4:00pm
He tagged Me a “Seer”
& leapt upon Me
when I aspired toward God —
He made Me fall in love
lasting through two decades
through two husbands
both of whom
cannot understand
The Hawk Living Room 2:28pm
I never felt the loss of My Mother
says My 2nd Husband —
He’s a Doctor — He should know —
and Yes, I admit it —
I told My Self when She was diagnosed
with Her Killer Brain Tumour —
I declared to My Self
“I will never feel The Pain –”
I swore it
and had only one session of tears
two months before She died
That was It — unless You want to count
The Shower Of Silver Lights
which cracked over Me
four days after My Mother died
leaving Me in a departed way
November 6, The Hawk West Desk Window 9:35pm
I saw The Pain
of His Parents’ Separation
flash across His Teenage Face:
six years later
when to My Son I felt I could confess
a poisonous love I husbanded
too long
am husbanding still — now My Daughter
runs Her Mother’s Risk
of another broken home
the one Eliza’s been homesick for
all Her Life
The Hawk Dining Room 11:11am
I stand in The Dining Room Window
My Right Arm crooked against
the back of a chair —
I gaze out to The Grey Ocean
slightly stooped, Me that is
and contemplate the remainder of My Life
however many days
Joanna Gilman Hyde 