Berries

Tiny stars and dotted prisms

Glitter on burgundy spheres,

With mint so bright it sears

Like Eucharist at catechisms.

 

Twisted colors melt and down;

Thoughts collide, chartering about

Until gossamer wings sprout,

So you can lift from the ground.

The Evolution of Eating

Milk.

Milk,

Sweet, warm milk.

Sweet, tasty, warm, white milk.

 

Rice.

White and stiff

Gooey, tasting like milk.

 

Sweet apple juice,

Sweet warm milk,

Gooey rice,

Apple juice.

 

Apples.

Bananas.

Bitter peas.

Green beans.

Pears, squash, spinach, broccoli, blueberries, raspberries, carrots.

 

Always that sweet warm milk.

 

Chicken.

Beef.

Ham.

Lamb.

Lintels, mangos, apricots, strawberries

 

Eggs.

Crackers.

Cereal.

Toast.

 

Eggy bread and French toast.

Pasta and tomatoes.

Chocolate, cake, ice cream.

 

Milk.

White, cold milk.

Helen’s Song

Paris and Menelaus were fools

        Confusing quiet malaise

With silent obedience. Giving

        Me jewels for my sweet gaze.

 

No god was my father, no egg birth.

        Footraces in my homeland

Contented me mo more than my suitors,

        Which were more than a thousand.

 

Older men are suppose to be wise;

        Younger are more passionate,

Yet I was nothing but a trophy

        Tangled in their power net.

 

I went to Troy because I loved,

        And I was horribly wrong.

Enduring ten-years of wall watching,

        My soul was lost all along.

The End of a Circle

Summons. I am bound to answer

And bow before a great alter.

Cursed to spill my victim blood

Remembered only as a messy smear.

Fate, weaving, controls our end.

Ibex.  Nothing remains the same,

Changes, except our true names.

Enough of what I used to be.

Fallen

Wandering on the barren earth,

I rack my heart against the stone,

Not understanding why I am here.

Gone are the stars and winds.

Longing for those wonderful winds.

Endless is my desire for my life.

Summer has fallen cruelly away

Sounding my torturous pain.

The Three Little Pigs According to a Three Year Old

Evan: Mommy, let’s play Three Little Pigs!

 

Me: Ok, Evan.

 

Evan: You’re the Big Bad Wolf!  And I’m the Little Pig!  This is my house of sticks!  You can’t get me!

 

Me: (Smiling as I sauntered over.  I kneeled down to be eye level with the coffee between the wolf and the pig.)  Little pig.  Little pig.  Let me in!  (Enter a creepy thought of the Shinning.  I mean Shining. )

 

Evan: NO!  (Close enough)

 

Me: Then I’ll huff, and I’ll puff, and I’ll blow your house in!  (Huffed and Puffed)

 

(Evan threw a great jab into my nose.  Sean laughed from the couch.  Evan grinned in triumph.)

 

Evan: Big Bad Wolf!  You can’t blow my house down!  It’s made of sticks!  And I punched you!

 

I guess if you can’t have a good defense, you might as well have a good offense.  Thank God he didn’t break my nose.

The Day After . . . the Illness

I think the day after an illness is the hardest.  When they’re sick, they want you.  They want juice.  They want crackers.  They want their blankets and stuff animals.  They just lay in front of the TV, watching with a dazed look as you worry about the fever, the vomit, their clothes, their hunger strike.  You worry you’ll get sick.  You get nothing done during the day, so you stay up late trying to finish the chores, scolding yourself over how you should be in bed in case you get sick.

 

 

Then the morning comes, and the children are awake and well, healthy and happy energetic and robust.  The techno-colored birds are singing.  Big-eyed squirrels run, gathering nuts.  The sun shines in the windows and waves at the healthy family.  Everything is right.  Until they realize you are not going to cater to their every whim like you did yesterday. 

 

No, you can’t have a sucker for breakfast.  No, the muffins are not in the box.  No, the muffins are not ready; I just put them in.  No, you may not have a Popsicle, even if you had one for breakfast yesterday.

 

Then they whine and cry.  They fight and bicker.  They scream and yell.  They make ridiculous claims and ridiculous requests.  They throw temper tantrums when they don’t get their way.  They whine “mom” with every sentence.  They hang on you like lead weights in your arms or a ball and chain around your ankle.  They are whining, whining, whining.

 

No, don’t push your brother.  No, you can’t have juice; drink your milk.  No, that’s hot.  No, you can’t play with the dish sponge.  No, don’t hit your brother.  No, don’t drop your plate because you don’t want to eat.

 

Today you have to go to the grocery store because you didn’t yesterday.  You didn’t want your children to be sicker, and you didn’t want to make other people sick.  But now you’re out of milk, bread, cheese, eggs, and ohdeargod juice.  If you want to make any kind of dinner, you have to take your whining, crying children to the store, where you will be judged for breeding such brats.

 

No, we don’t touch that.  No, we don’t run in the parking lot.  So help me God-  No, we don’t hit our brother.  No, we don’t kick our brother.  No, we don’t touch the fruit.  No, we don’t touch the GLASS JARS.  No, we don’t touch the candy.

 

Because today is today, you have to go to the bank.  You need to do a few deposits.  You need to visit the coin machine.  You need to go to Target because you have a baby shower to go to next weekend.  You wonder if you can wait another day on buying more laundry detergent because you don’t think you can handle another store, another parking lot, another check out line.  You look on the list and wonder if the library books need to go back today.  Why the hell don’t they stamp them any more? 

 

No, we don’t take his toy.  Please share.  No, you’re not watching any more cartoons.  No, it’s time to get dressed.  No, don’t hide.  Brush your teeth.  No more TV!  Don’t dump all the toys out.  Don’t dump all the Legoes out.

 

The family room is a mess from the blankets and the stuff animals.  When did we last eat popcorn?  There is a load in the dryer waiting in a wrinkled mess to be folded.  At least the kitchen is clean.  But you have to empty out the dishwasher.  Dishes, welcome to your new home, the dishwasher.  Can I take a shower now?  So you take a quick shower to become human and to have five minutes alone without whining, but you hear them whining outside the door. 

 

No, no TV.  Go outside and play.  Get some fresh air.  Remember fresh air.  Oh, wait.  It’s raining.  How about play dough?  Don’t eat the play dough.  Don’t take his play-dough.  Share.  No running off with play dough; that’s why we only have two colors left.  Is it naptime yet?

 

Then you run into the office and shut the door behind you.  You lean your body against the door, blocking any entry, taking deep breaths.  The boys are whining and crying and fighting.  Your husband is on a business call, selling his product, making sure you have electricity and car for another month.  You grab a pen and a sheet of paper.  You write in big bold letters:

 

Let’s Trade Jobs for Today!

 

The whining has stopped, only to resume at a louder pitch.  Some one has drawn blood.  You take a deep breath and duck out of the room. 

 

Ok.  Let’s put this away.  Here.  Let’s get out the trikes.  Evan, here’s yours.  Seanny, here’s yours.  Yes, you may have Viper.  Good job, Seanny.  Good sharing, Evan.  Look at my boys!  You guys are good at this.  Evan, try to pedal.  You can do it!

 

You sit and watch the living room biking.  You are showered and dressed, thinking about that wonderful new invention of caffeinated hot chocolate and the Hershey bars your evil best friend “accidently” left behind.  No one is crying or whining or fighting or yelling.  They’re actually laughing, having a good time and being nice to each other.

 

The husband comes out of the office to say he’s ready to trade.  There’s no shoe to throw at him.

 

 

 

Your Reguarly Scheduled Post has been Interrupted

So Sean was tired on Friday as he recuperated, but Evan was a tornado.  Saturday both boys romped and played as usual.  Sunday morning they were up early as usual with their energy just bursting throughout the house, and I breathed a sigh of relief, knowing the worse was over.  Then Evan woke from his nap.

 

He was crying, which he never does.  He was hot.  101 to be exact.  While I ran upstairs to get the Mortim, he threw up.  A lot.  All over the couch and himself.

 

As I sprayed the vomit off his clothes and the sofa cover down the disposal, I realized how calm I acted, not a twinge of disgust or the feeling of nausea.  In college, it was an unspoken rule of the room that if you prayed to the porcelain god you were cleaning it up.  It made me sick just to listen, imagining.  *shudder*  Then I was a teacher’s assistant for kindergarten.  One day the teacher asked me to take one of the little girls to the office because she was complaining of not feeling well.  As I escorted the girl to the office, she vomited all over my beloved Doc Martins.  I believed I had two choices on how to react.  I could be disgusted, making a face or a sound to show it, wiping off my boots on the grass, or I could ignore the vomit and comfort the sick, humiliated little five-year-old.  I was smart enough to bend down and hug the girl and tell her everything is going to be all right.

 

So last night as Evan vomited up the bead sticks that I stupidly allowed him to eat one after another (and vomit them one after another), I dutifully stripped the bed, stripped the boy, delivered the boy into the bath, and hosed off the vomit.  At the end of the night we were running out of sheets just as the first set was drying.  After several times of delivering Evan back into his bed because he was so hot and miserable, I relented and let him stay in bed with us.  Of course, I was too lazy to get the throw up bowl, so when he expelled his juice all over my side of the bed, I only had myself to blame.  Luckily I sat up quick enough for him to miss my hair.    So began another hour of trying to convince him to sleep in his bed as I threw a towel over the wet sport because the king is the only one without an extra set of sheets.  (Yeah, I know.  I’m an idiot.)  In the end, I slept with my head at the foot of the bed, and Evan slept curled up next to his dad.

 

Instead of writing a brilliant and cute post about Valentine’s Day and my husband’s remarkable gift of gift-giving, I am up before the boys, looking at a very interesting day, which includes a rainy day and an office STILL looking like the aftermath of a tornado on a paper factor or maybe just an IRS office.  Oh, and over 3/4ths of a turkey I’m not sure what to do with because I was too tired to carve completely yet.  Ugh.

Kung Fu Panda Shirts

I just have to say: where the hell are the Kung Fu Panda shirts!  Who makes a kid movie and not make TONS of merchandise for it?!  I have TWO Wall*e shirts, and I could have bought more, and this was a movie about no consumerism.  But what about Kung Fu Panda, tailor made for every little boy?  I haven’t found one damn shirt, and THAT is all Evan wants to wear. 

 

I want a Kung Fu Panda shirt, Mommy.  Where’s my Kung Fu Panda shirt, Mommy?  I want to wear a Kung Fu Panda shirt, Mommy.  That’s NOT a Kung Fu Panda shirt, Mommy!

 

So listen up, Dreamworks execs.  We need Kung Fu Panda shirts stat!  And would it kill you to put a few more Kung Fu Panda toys on the market?  Really?

The MOON!

Sean: (With great pride, points) Moon!

 

Me: (not sure how to proceed) Good try, Sean!  That’s actually the sun.

 

Sean: (insisting with pride) Moon!

 

Me: Close, Sean.  It’s the sun.

 

Sean: MOON!

 

Me: (sigh) Very close, Sean.  It looks just like the moon but brighter.  It’s a cartoon sun.  The moon comes out at night; the sun comes out during the day.  It’s day time, so that’s the sun.

 

Sean: (points, smiling with pride) MOON!

 

Me: (kissing his head) Good job, Sean.

 

There will be plenty of time to correct him later, right?