There was a period in my life, kind of like now, where much of my time was spent waiting for others. I strengthened patience and cultivated a love for aloneness. Keeping busy swallowed much of the time; but dreams, daydreams really; devoured my attention, greedy for past memories and future fantasies.
I remember at one point watching the poplar trees in my front yard for what seemed like hours, day after day. I felt like a prisoner locked in a tower only to be released when the little guards would wake from their naps, and I could escape to the store to buy them some milk.
Poplars in the Wind
Gentle wind claim my soul,
shimmering leaves sway to and fro.
I want to feel the touch of a dream,
Sense its mist, sense serene.
Shimmering leaves gold and green.
I want to touch the heart of a dream.
Strange as it seems, I just can't win.
I want to reach through and
touch the heart of a dream,
Entwine close within.
How cleverly he plays the fool
I hear the royal subjects say.
How he makes them feel superior
with his clumsy movements stumbling play.
Then when in a drunken stupor the idle braggarts lay;
The fool with richness overflowing quietly steals away.
I am a Ronin Samurai---
I swear to God this leotard is twenty years old,
and I have been dancing all of their lives.
Children with nondescript eyes
are so sweet they bring tears to mine.
This servitude from some other time.
I guess I was just a little to open with you.
I accepted your invitation, then away your flew.
Well, I don't think of you much anymore --
Only when my eyes haze
as a present conversation fades.
A scowling face chastises my distraction
while something you said rattles in my brain ,
and I fear you think, "God, she's insane."
Gentle wind claim my soul,
raging fierce now, out of control.
There are many things a man can do
that make him feel dark and mean.
But raging wind you're no fool,
and it ain't a crime to have a dream.
May, 1986
