Showing posts with label Family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Family. Show all posts

Thursday, August 31, 2017

At the Lake

Lake Chelan
Photo © 2017 Jennifer Wagner


Love comes in soft waves—or bold,
and leans in toward our shores—
keeping and staying, freeing and swaying,
ebbing—

Chasing us, when we need to be chased,
holding us, starlit, and
echoing
long
after
night falls.


© 2017 Jennifer Wagner

An acrostic for dVerse.

Lake Chelan is a lake in central Washington and is one of my favorite places to be.  My family has done a lot of living, laughing and loving while visiting there.

Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Brothertime


Stretched out on the grass
looking up at the stars,
hands tucked behind their heads,
feet crossed at the ankles, bellies full--
fat for the sacrifice
of what lurks, stalks them
in the dark: werewolves, zombies, orcs . . .

While dragons skitter-fly by
on iridescent wings
they craft stories
from far away worlds
to see which of them
can scare the others most.

A fir wood fire crackles in the pit.
Marshmallow bits stick to their lips.

Can I have your room when you move out?”

Laughing, with brave faces,
their eyes in firelight reflect the wonder
of what it will be like to be the first to leave,
be the ones left behind.

A large spark darts skyward
splitting unspoken thoughts
and they turn back to stories of goblins, of ghosts,
on this warm night in brothertime,
shaking off the growing chill
of jitters a bit more real.



© 2015 Jennifer Wagner


For dVerse Poetics: Brothers/Brotherhood. Hope you come and join in the fun!

Tuesday, February 3, 2015

he forgot the (r) in togethe(r)


i didn't point it out
actually, i didn't even notice
but that's how love is,
                                               too


© 2015 Jennifer Wagner


Poem © 2014 Andrew Romero
Photo © 2014 Jennifer Wagner

My eldest son wrote this concrete poem and put it on the door of my room last Mother's Day (on wide strips of tape, not right on the door itself, ha). I have yet to take it down because, well, why take it down? And it is the month of love!

Tuesday, December 16, 2014

Grandma, Mickey and Me




“It forks in and out a little like the tongue   
Of that frightened garter snake we caught   
At Cloverfield, you and me, Jenny   
So long ago.”  -- To the Muse, JAMES WRIGHT


Grandma killed many snakes
in her yard by the tavern
when she had to.

She could do anything
and she wasn’t afraid
of anything.
Or maybe she was
afraid of everything
and she’d just done
what she’d had to do.

She wore a cowgirl hat
with a feather roach clip
and earrings with sayings on them
like, “No” and “Well, maybe.”
She wore tight animal print pants,
read The National Enquirer
and swore the pig-boy was real.

Her little trailer sat
just off the road
and we would stay the night
with her when we were young
and play board and card games
and watch TV.

She would sneak over to the
tavern and bring us special treats
like fried tater tots
with ham and cheese inside.

I’d get to sleep
with Grandma
in her “big” bed
and my cousin would sleep
on the couch in front of her old TV,
the bust of JFK,
and her framed photo
of the son she never got to see.

During the day
we’d go off to explore,
especially the train tracks
where we’d imagine hobos
hitching rides.

She’d told me,
“the bees are out,
thicker than molasses.”
And to “be careful. 
Just be still
when they come near you.”

And I was,
except when
my cousin distracted me
by making me laugh
and I swatted my arm
and got my first bee sting.

It hurt
like H-E-DOUBLE-HOCKEY-STICKS
but I knew Grandma
could take care of it.

We wove our way back
to Grandma’s where she
plucked a leaf from her
aloe vera plant and squeezed
some of the gel out onto the sting.
It was better than new.
She could do anything, like I said.

Pig-boy might have even been real.
You never know.


© 2014 Jennifer Wagner



A couple of days ago Grace presented us with the work of James Wright.  She said we can use a “line of verse as a jumping board” and to “feel free to explore where your muse takes you.”  My poem isn’t the same subject as the one of Wright’s that I springboarded from, but it’s where my muse lead.  I think I went autobiographical because of Wright’s simple family roots and of course, “Jenny.”