Lost in the Pattern

by Justine C. Tajonera

Something abut this mark
will make me stay
for hours
on end.

Something about the color,
the network of lines,
the little shapes
and letters
converge in my mind,
drawing me into
a spiral of thinking
that has no
logic.

If I will just be,
I could walk into the path
of this blue leaf
and never
come back.

The red roots of love
are pulling me back,
upwards into
a place where
I need to breathe.

But there it is,
hiding somewhere,
a place that I will
return to
when I will not have
to live.

(Dec. 29, 2009)

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/lavenderlou/2415987179/in/photostream/

Note: Flow is the mental state of operation in which the person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity. Proposed by Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, the positive psychology concept has been widely referenced across a variety of fields.

Four Leaf Clover

by Justine C. Tajonera

She gives me a four leaf clover
for Christmas,
wishing me
all the
best.

I stare at the four leaves,
thinking of the five of
us,
our children, husbands,
former lovers
and interlocking stories
forming a pattern
all on their own,

talismans luckier than
any of these leaves
that embellish my ring
finger.

Our collective memories
are more verdant
than any field,

our tears and inside
jokes
more precious
than any
charm.

I hold this precious
trust among us,
greedily close
to my heart:

how beautiful
the leaves we make
in one perfect
stem of
friendship.

(Dec. 28, 2009)


Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/cygnus921/2678359760/

One Hundred Kisses

By Justine C. Tajonera

One hundred kisses
good night.
One hundred omens
of good fortune
and love follow
you with each
endearment
at the end
of our day.

I look at
the three of us
and I am still
amazed.

No number
could ever
describe
how lucky I am
to belong
to the two
of you.

(Dec. 27, 2009)

The Code Of Dress

By Justine C. Tajonera

When I can wear anything,
I wear only one
thing.

My body has learned
to speak in codes
of comfort
and delight.

My toes have learned
to uncurl and
demand
freedom.

My heels, while rough
and worn,
have dug down,
close to the earth,
refusing to be put
on a pedestal.

My skin has learned
the subtleties of
temperature,
slowly warming up
or cooling down,
with not much need
for the artifice
of air conditioning.

When the rainbow
is presented
to this monarch,
she chooses
the simplicity of
denim
blues
and cotton
prints
and staple
unruffled
black.

I listen closely now
for freedom
has warranted
the absolutes
of choice.

(Dec. 22, 2009)

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/brianteutsch/72243320/

Playing Dead

By Justine C. Tajonera

There's no one at fault,
really,
no one to blame
for the scabs on their legs,
the way they have to sleep
the side of the street.

There's no particular reason
why their house burned down
or why they need to carry
a sack of old plastic bottles
to buy their sister
dinner.

There's no one in particular
who is responsible for
their parents' resignation
or the evil way that
they play along with
what's given them,
pretending is better than
believing.

But I close my eyes
and imagine, too,
that if it were all up to
me,
I wouldn't let them
stay where they are:
not knowing any better,
not getting a chance.

If it were all my
responsibility,
I wouldn't lay down
my arms
and play
dead.

(Dec. 23, 2009)
Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/billselak/2181910407/

Opening Line

By Justine C. Tajonera

It's just a simple conversation:
let's get together,
you and I,
let's talk all afternoon,
all evening,
if we can.

Then why is it so hard
to get this simple
message through
to you?

There's a dance around
this thing we are
doing,
something called
convention,
expectation.

I don't know.

There should be you
and me.
But in between

there are castles,
walls, screens,
stories, lies,
assumptions, rumors,
lakes, therapy,
thesis statements,
phobias and
pictures of
us

that are scrubbed
clean from my
facebook wall
but surfacing randomly

in my dreams:
mug shots flying by
as I do something ordinary
like open a door.

I want to open a door.
That's all I want
to do.

(Dec. 23, 2009)

For S.
Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/starrynight1/2250956869/

The Mermaid

By Justine C. Tajonera

There used to be a mermaid
who was scared of drowning,
beautiful scales undulating
in the waves,
warding off
inevitabilities
like
love.

There were sailors
aplenty who were
wrecked by
her singing,
but not so much more
than the mermaid herself,
whose heart had turned
to stone.

She had wandered in
and out
of the wrong fairy
tales,
bewildered by an
earnest toy soldier
and the icy touch
of a well meaning
ghost.

There was a prince
somewhere,
she heard,
waiting to find
her.

And so one day,
he did come
for her,
fins and
all.

But that was after
she had learned to
breathe.

(Dec. 22, 2009)

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/kathryn_rotondo/2180997509/

A Dark Place

by Justine C. Tajonera

It was a dark place she entered
after her father died.
It was not a window
with a bleak view,
no.

It was a darkness that
crawled up her very skin,
chilling her bones
so that they felt brittle
and weak.

It was a metal rake
that scraped her scalp,
from forehead
to spine.

It was an unbearable
screeching in her ears,
a caged bird's
wings beating against
her chest,
clawing at her heart.

She endured this
while she smiled, walked,
worked.

Her hands and nape
broke out in cold
sweat,
but she held on
to everyday gestures
like picking up the phone
and saying, no,
mimicking the word
hello.

No one,
no one would know
this place
except those
who have suffered
this very same
fate.

Today she is unfettered.
But she will not
forget.
There is no light,
no compassion
without re-
membering this
horrific
living
death.

(Dec. 22, 2009)
For one of the bravest people I know.

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/pierreethier/4034207755/

The Swimmer

by Justine C. Tajonera

Last week, my son
learned to swim.
The water was a distance
breached,
a milestone almost
as breath taking as
his first steps.

Unlike walking,
this time, he gasped and
cried and pushed himself
to reach an edge,
a hand,
something to hold on to.

I held him in my arms
as he shivered with his
own shock
and surprise
at his innate talent
for survival.

I wanted to coddle him,

keep him safe
from the elements,
tucked in my circle
of maternal indulgence.

But it is an indulgence.

I let him tug away
from me,
as far as my heart
can bear.

Children become men.
And while swimmers once
curled in the water of
the womb,
it is in the wide, wide sea
where they
thrive.

(Dec. 21, 2009)

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/brianauer/2599299352/

Black Valentine by Tess Gallagher

I post this because I ran into it while researching Tess Gallagher, the poetry teacher of Alice Sebold (author of The Lovely Bones and Lucky), the one she turned to at the time of her rape for some support.

In my first reading of it (because I read it three times in a span of minutes), I started to cry. "Silly to ask now if the hair/ she put on the altar, imagining her power over/ his passage, was dead or living."

Silly indeed. How does one measure loss? The same way one measures love, I guess.

Most of the poets I read have been, in some way, influenced by Buddhism. For what is poetry without meditation? The most striking insights that can find its frame only in fragments of words are prayer-songs or, in my own assessment, poems.

Black Valentine

by Tess Gallagher

I run the comb through his lush hair,

letting it think into my wrist

the way the wrist whispers to the cards

with punctuation and savvy in a game of solitaire.

So much not to be said the scissors

are saying in the hasp and sheer

of the morning. Eleven years I’ve cut

his hair and even now, this last time, we hide

fear to save pleasure

as bulwark. My dearest—the hair says as it brushes my

thighs—my only—on the way to the floor. If the hair

is a soul-sign, the soul obeys our gravity, piles up

in animal mounds and worships the feet. We’re

silent so peace rays over us like Bernice’s hair

shaken out across the heavens. If there were gods

we are to believe they animated her shorn locks

with more darkness than light, and harm

was put by after the Syrian campaign, and

harm was put by as you tipped the cards

from the table like a child bored

with losing. I spread my hair like a tent over us

to make safety wear its twin heads, one to face death,

the other blasted so piteously by love

you throw the lantern of the moment against

the wall and take me in with our old joke, the one

that marks my northern skies, “Hey, babe,” you say

like a man who knows how to live on earth. “Hey,”

with your arm around my hips, “what you doing

after work?” Silly to ask now if the hair

she put on the altar, imagining her power over

his passage, was dead or living.

Image of Tess Gallagher from http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=177702

Acknowledgements

By Justine C. Tajonera

When all is said and done,
a page or two
documents
the writer's gratitude.

Some readers skip this page,
unimportant, not part
of the story
that was bought.
 
It is technical or wordy
or saccharine or
effusive
or irrelevant.

It stitches the story
with invisible thread,
containing only something
that the author would see,
making visible a few words
to stand for the back
story that will never be
told.

(Dec. 20, 2009)

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/suanie/2795032725/

Ghosts

By Justine C. Tajonera

In the aftermath, the walls
were stripped of the framed
photographs,
small mementos
that no one would
have recognized
are replaced
or gone.

This is the landscape
of things gone
wrong,
slowly,
agonizingly
so.

Any of these banisters,
door frames,
linen and
furniture,
stand for
something.

Something now lost,
irretrievable.

This place retains
its frame,
but it is a battlefield,
an emptiness,
a page excruciatingly
rubbed raw

and now blank.

(Dec. 20,  2009)



Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/clanlife/247395827/

Hindsight

By Justine C. Tajonera

They debate, in Copenhagen, the solutions
to our own stupidities.
Through a haze of year end
festivities,
I wonder if we do
learn our lessons.

On the street this morning,
a boy was sleeping
by the side
of the road,
his feet in slippers
sticking out of
a small cart.
His shaven head
reminded me
of my son’s.

The view from behind
the tricycle I ride
to work,
shows me a clear view
of things
I am leaving behind.

Is all this hind-
sight
hindering
or helping?

I hold the coins in
my hand
and pay for
my fare.

(Dec. 18, 2009)

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/suburbanbloke/405644822/

The Temple

By Justine C. Tajonera

My version of heaven:
a leafy place with the
wind rustling secret
gardens, deep pools
tucked in
unexpected niches.
A place to be still.

Would a star have
desires?
It does not circle
anything.
Rather, its own intensity
and strength
draws matter into
its sphere.

Would it look longingly
at an imperfect
existence
where it is important
to find time,
where consequence
follows action?

Is it really rest
that I long for?
Or bringing worlds
into being?
And why
why would it
matter?

If I reached out
in the darkness
would I find you
or only a fragment
of myself?

Surely, surely
that day will come
as even, now,
I fold my
mortal hands
in prayer.

(Dec. 17, 2009)

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/john/4776861/

This Side Of The Story

by Justine C. Tajonera

Hardly anyone asks for
the opinion of
the wicked stepmother,
the dead wives of Bluebeard
are mute and damning
evidence,
no one checks
for divorces
after the happy ever
after,
no one asks the coveted
Ibong Adarna
why she sings
seven songs.

A story is
a story
because someone
tells it.

Remember what precious
cups your ears
make
for the spinner
of the tale.

Choose your stories
well,
for there will always
be
stories.

They might corrupt,
they might be
false,
they might be subjugated,
censored
and suppressed.

But remember, too,
that they might reveal,
redeem
and stir mountains
to move
or raise dying embers
into the heavens.

(Dec. 16, 2009)
For the writers and journalists of the Philippines.

Image of a fairy tale book from http://www.flickr.com/photos/gillianam/3448828297/

The Meaning Of A Meteor Shower

by Justine C. Tajonera

There was a night
that I missed a shower
of meteors:
behind locked doors,
shrouded in sadness
and regret.

There was a night
that I wondered about
the meteor
shower
I did not see:
all the things I want,
all the things I am
denied.

There was a night
that I heard about
a meteor
shower:
Is there still such a
thing as
magic
in this world?

Tonight there will be
a meteor shower
without
meanings,
passing the earth,
in its own
inexorable path.

(Dec. 15, 2009)

Image of a Perseid meteor shower from http://www.flickr.com/photos/adcuz/3825758719/in/photostream/

Like There's No Tomorrow

By Justine C. Tajonera

You've heard it before:
do things like
there's no
tomorrow.

It sounds trite,
over-used.

But what if there
really isn't any
tomorrow?

As you hurtle towards
the sun,
and dance in the air,
dangling in space,
tied to the core
of rock
with the weak strings
of gravity

ask yourself
if there really
is a
tomorrow.

The revolutions
of the earth
and the constant aging
of your cells
have a claim
on your body.

But what animates
your bones,
belongs to an order
that cannot
disappear:

cannot be created,
cannot be destroyed.

And for such elements
of the eternal,
there is no such thing
as time.

(Dec. 14, 2009)

Image from nmazca.com

At The Edge Of The Pool

By Justine C. Tajonera

My little swimmer
stands at the edge
of the pool.
He asks me to
move away,
sure in himself,
sure that he can
jump on his own.

My heart skips
a beat.
How can he be
so sure,
even as I stand
a little further
away?

I am a fallible
net,
inconstant, easily hurt,
a mixed bag
of emotions.
I am no
rock.

But his face
is full of light,
absolutely certain
of the comfort
of my arms,
whether I am near
or far.

I stand in
awe.

(Dec. 13, 2009)

Image from Freefoto.com

Kindness

By Justine C. Tajonera

How easy it is
to hurt someone:
a word,
a tone of voice,
a look,
a resistance.

It is far easier
to wound than it is
to heal
and we save our
most cruel
jabs
for those
we love.

When you come
through the door
I can hurt you
with my little
resentments or
I can just
hold you.

These fissures
are bound to
happen
over time
and only kindness
is the salve
for what is
broken.

(Dec. 12, 2009)

Blankets

By Justine C. Tajonera

I save each sleepy kiss
planted on my cheek,
each fistful of my hair that
my son gathers in
his hands.

There's a palpable warmth
that comes from being
with him.

I know that this will last
up to a certain age,
I know it in my head.

While it is comforting to know
that cycles repeat themselves
in life
I put my hands across time
like trying to tuck
a bed sheet
in a frame,
away from the
inevitable.

I never knew this
kind of relentless
counting of the
hours
until he tumbled
into our
hearts.

Each morning
I count
myself lucky
to have him snuggled
in my arms.

Nothing could be
simpler than his
body
warmth.

(Dec. 11, 2009)


Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/amyvdh/2095120543/

Al Gore's Poem

I had to write about this. It's rare to find an environmentalist who was a former politician who now expresses himself through poetry. In his book, Our Choice, Al Gore, of An Inconvenient Truth fame, wrote a  poem which appears on page 28 of the book. It's actually quite haunting in its imagery. He takes the time to choose words carefully, like "Neptune's bones" and one of my favorite lines is constructed, thus: "Ice fathers flood for a season." And the line that follows brings to mind Ondoy: "A hard rain comes quickly."

Poetry truly is the only way to distill anything complicated in our lives.

One thin September soon
A floating continent disappears
In midnight sun

Vapors rise as
Fever settles on an acid sea
Neptune's bones dissolve

Snow glides from the mountain
Ice fathers floods for a season
A hard rain comes quickly

Then dirt is parched
Kindling is placed in the forest
For the lightning's celebration

Unknown creatures
Take their leave, unmourned
Horsemen ready their stirrups

Passion seeks heroes and friends
The bell of the city
On the hill is rung
 
The shepherd cries
The hour of choosing has arrived
Here are your tools 


Image is the cover of Al Gore's book, Our Choice

Chagall Peering Over My Desk

by Justine C. Tajonera

I bought the art magnet
at a Guggeinheim exhibit
in Las Vegas.

I only bought it
because Chagall
was one of my mother's
favorite
artists.

But it has come
to mean
so many things:

transition through work,
three weeks in
Europe,
impossible dreams.

The Eiffel tower,
the Cubist forms,
the Janus-faced man,
the inimitable orange
tabby
watch over
my desk,
reminding me
of a different
world.

Just today
I looked back
at the window:
so many interpretations,
only one
life.

Where am I
in this little imitation
of the painting:

I thought I was
the observant
feline:

watching from
a window,
in the middle of
worlds,
unaware of being
the center
of focus.

But I am outside
the canvas
where everything is
considered,
and where anything
can be
done.

(Dec. 10, 2009)

Marc Chagall (1887-1985), a Russian-French painter, pioneer of modernism and one of the greatest figurative artists of the twentieth century. 

Image from http://keithperkins.net/2008/07/25/paris-through-the-window

Birthday Gift

By Justine C. Tajonera

We were at a loss over
what to give you.
You haven't read
all your books,
you have too many
toys and we don't have
enough space.


But when you
opened your eyes
and smiled
at us,
we realized
that there is no
gift
quite like
you.

You're the most
wonderful thing
that happened
to us,
little one.

There's nothing
we can give you
that would ever
approximate
your very
existence.

So, we didn't worry
over things like
presents, though
we gave you one,
anyway.

We linked hands
and gathered you
in our
arms
in
gratitude.

(Dec. 9, 2009)
For Badger

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/marcelgermain/2267526122/

Dreams About A Letter

By Justine C. Tajonera

She dreams about him
sometimes.
She always wakes up
at the moment
when he is about
to reply
to her.

A year ago
she told him
that she cared
for him,
knowing full well
that he would not
know what
it cost her
to write down
the words.

When she catches herself
clawing back
into her sleep
to retrieve
the thing
he did not
say

she remembers
that she was courageous,
that she once did
what she thought
she could not
do.

So while this story
is far from over,
she is lucky
that she has
no
regrets.

(Dec. 8, 2009)

For Kat


Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/funtik/1175522045/

Family Feast

by Justine C. Tajonera

Once a week,
we gather around
a table and
eat.
At least,
those of us
who can make
it.

It used to be
that a whole troop
of us could crowd
an aunt's home.

Lately, migrations
have taken their
toll.

The table, teeming
with food
and crowded with
noisy children,
is absent.

This morning,
I received a Facebook
post
from my brother:
I miss you.

A hug and my head
on his shoulder
would have
sufficed.

Even with affection
never lacking,
the distances
are
great.

So, we do our best
to go on with imperfect
tools of expression
and celebrate family
in our own
ironically
disparate
ways.

(Dec. 7, 2009)

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/wurz/2521462049/

The Easy Mysteries of Play

By Justine C. Tajonera

He knows exactly
when to start and
when to stop,
even when his
reserves seem
endless.

I always
get a thrill
when he talks
to his
toys.

Where does
he get that
strange combination
of adult
admonitions
and his own
brand of
logic?

I never know
what he will
say or what will
fascinate him
for the day.

His play
has an easy, joyful
grace.
His smiles are
steeped
in the delightful
mysteries
of the never,
never land
called
childhood.

(Dec. 6, 2009)

The Constraints Of Time

The hands of
the clock
move relentlessly
to the
right,
indifferent to
my state of
mind,
my appeals for
two more
minutes.

However,
the constraints
of time
are largely
imaginary.

Beyond
this moment
a great chasm
divides me
from the past
and the future
is veiled with
uncertainty.

It is either paralysis
or freedom
now.

So I hand my son's
toothbrush
to my husband,
mindful of my
son's teeth
tonight
and kiss them
both
good night.

(Dec. 5, 2009)

Yellow Flowers In The Trike

By Justine C. Tajonera

At first I don't notice it
but this trike
is well-loved.

The worn leatherette seats
are mended,
a handmade mirror
is screwed near
the ceiling,

all the wires that
secure the hooks
on the frame
of the windshield
are covered
with black rubber,
the black handrail
hanging near
the side car
is clean and
well maintained.

It's only a trike,
you might say,
random in selection,
really,
because I'll never know
when I'll ever
ride it
again.

But somehow,
the image of
the bright yellow flowers
twined around
the sampaguita,
hanging from
the ceiling hooks
of the trike
made me smile
the whole
day.

Someone bothered.
Someone thought
this place
was sacred.

And I am grateful
to the gruff old man
who drives this
machine.
He doesn't smile
but he's generous
with us
who hand over
our seven
pesos
in the morning.

(Dec. 4, 2009)

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/jhuntarun/2799886444/

Books By My Bed

By Justine C. Tajonera

When the household
settles down,
when the curtains are
drawn,
when the dishes
have been
dried,
I lean towards
the lamp
and reach out
for the silent
companion
for the
night.


I do not feel
deprived
of sleep
as the narrator
slowly
unfolds,
spreads out
and rolls to the
edges
of the
story.

I am privileged,
laughing privately
or moved
to tears.

And while I may not
have reread
most of the
books by
my bed,

I am loath
to part
with such
faithful friends
and I carry them
from house to
house,
familiar
and once-beloved,
like a child
who cannot
let go
of the ragged
old
bear.

(Dec. 3, 2009)

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/nicmcphee/352157407/in/photostream/

My Clothes In My Son's Embrace

By Justine C. Tajonera

I came home
to my son
one night,
already sleeping,
clutching a framed
picture of his dad
and me,
his face
buried in a dress
that I had tossed
aside
that morning.

My clothes
in my son's
embrace
hold depths
of meaning
I will never quite
fathom.

Nothing I throw
aside
is worthless,
nothing I say
is insignificant.

(Dec. 2, 2009)

Disagreement

By Justine C. Tajonera

When did disagreement become
ugly or coarse?
When it shows its colors,
we run for cover,
avoiding it
at all
costs.

We thrive on what is
united, at peace,
in harmony

but fail to realize
that it is tension
that drives all action
in the universe.

I am here,
you are there.
It is simple to be
parallel
forever.

But it is the intersections
that propel passion,
and create energy.

You and I will
always meet in
space:
collision, fusion
or the strange biological
compromise of
symbiosis.

Disagreements signal

not the breakdown
of relationships.

No, disagreements are
the highest form
of respect.

Only equals
disagree.

(Dec. 1, 2009)

Image of particle collision from http://www.flickr.com/photos/hackshaven/3834247003/