Wait

This was inspired by a school shooting on October 24, 2014. A fourteen year old boy – who apparently had everything in his favor including family ties, strong tribal connections, a winning smile, intelligence and a good sense of humor – shot four fellow students and himself. He and another are dead. Two girls are alive but so disfigured they have not yet been identified and one young man may have lost his jaw. What is it about young heartbreak that drives children to such measures? (Remember, this boy had one foot merely dangling over the boundary between childhood and the world of a teenager, and was years away from becoming a man.)

Son- Before the Story
i am broken
how will i mend?
how is it possible
to shine in her eyes
one day
and be invisible to her
the next?
I cannot sweat it off

Father – Before the Story
just wait
you have loved her one short year
a nano-second, a blink
there will be another girl
many other girls
that will shine in your eyes
take time
wait

The Story
there is no waiting
son hides the gun
in his day pack
between a sandwich
and her class picture

lunchtime – eight shots
two dead
four disfigured for life

What is Love?

Love is locked fingers
A thousand pin pricks
and
blood tests
Countless trips to the E.R.

Love is sixty-three
years of smiles
in the morning
and calm evenings of
good night

And one
I’ll really miss you
when you’re
gone

Text Message as Poetry

    In Watson Lake
     Getting fuel
Going on to Junction 37
 Stay the night there

        Great day
      Lots of wildlife: 
   black bear, stone sheep
      caribou, moose
            fox

                     The impressive 
                          Mountain Portage Rapids
                             on the Laird River makes        
                                     Lava Falls 
                                               look 
                                                   like 
                                                        a 
                                                          trickle
Saw a little toad
      headed 
         away from
            the river

                          Smart Toad

Small Cuts

  Small cuts    Deep wounds

         I say  
                 not
                      today    

 You hear 
           never 
                   again

 You say I hurt 

     I think 
               What       I done?
                        have

Time will tell
                    but I 
       won't 
               be 
                   listening

The Unclaimed Ticket

Rain outside
              Laughter within
Wine   Beer   Cold metal chairs
              The scent of popcorn
She left the yellow ticket in the hands of the grey haired lady    At the table
      Right
          inside
              the door
No one could miss it  Tucked inside the magenta envelope  ROGER scrawled from one side to the other in
splotchy lime green ink     Looking more like Wingdings than Times New Roman

The music starts
               Accordian
    Guitar                         Bass
She looks over her shoulder     No Roger
She looks over her shoulder
       No
          Roger
Rain outside
        Hot inside      Rumpled sheets
                           The next envelope will read
                                           Troy