Absent, Always
Are tears from professional spaces
though frustration is ever-present
in the manufactured air
And so too are hugs and hands
of comfort to rub shoulders, to cross
boundaries, to tear down walls
Only laughter remains to fill the awkward
silence, to diminish what makes us
human, to deny what keeps us sane
~Pamela Taylor © 2013
After the Funeral
~for Doris
The church doors open to embrace the midday
light, shimmering off the farmer’s pond.
The meadow grass—browned over and stiff—softens
a little in the November sun. This is all
that stands between me and the old country road.
As a child, I burst through these doors, holding
my little brother’s hand, eager to escape the confines
of patent leather shoes, squirm out of our Sunday
best and dip each claustrophobic toe into the cool
water. I can almost hear our mama’s voice
carried on the thin breeze of this last warm
autumn day, calling us home. And just like back then,
my dear brother, you were always the one
to listen, always the first one to cross over.
~Pamela Taylor © 2013
The Sensitive State of Security
The pace of trouble has nearly doubled.
The end could be complicated,
changing, struggling, hampered
by problems. Unable
to hear, the vast majority lost
faith, are already moving on.
To scare, to break their trust happens
on an ongoing basis. The battle
began with attacks, shifted the sensitive
state of security end to end.
Last week, all was compromised.
~Pamela L. Taylor © 2013
Erasure poem from the New York Times article “Health Website Enrollment Far Exceeds October Pace“
Heart Sick
This time it was a mild case:
fluctuating chills and fever,
swollen eyes, nose spouting mucus
into tissue balls. What it wants:
another warm body under chin-tucked
covers. What it gets: citrus and rest.
But I’ve seen it worse: this heart of mine—
unrecognizable—attacking itself like Lupus.
It comes home after every relapse, crumples
into the childhood bed strung out
on the last high. How can I forgive it again,
after I’ve scrubbed the stench of its vomit
from the bathroom floor, after I’ve slept
beside the hospital bed listening to the hiss
of machines breathing all night, after it’s exposed
in the harsh truth of daylight—bruised and black,
almost broken, never to be undamaged again?
~Pamela Taylor © 2013
Only One
I used to think one was magic,
all that remained when you divided
anything by itself. One turned
the tips and pads of fingers
into adding machines, helped
kindergarten hands solve the world’s
biggest problem: the number
of apples if Sally gave me three
when I already had five.
I’ll tell you this: I reveled in oneness
when it meant first and best,
something rare like moon rocks
or a ’49 Jackie Robinson baseball
card. But that was before I walked
into boardrooms and ballrooms
and failed to count any higher.
~Pamela Taylor © 2013
An Anagram on Vanity
Displayed on a six by twelve metal plate
Raised red letters scribe my name in block text—
PAM—trailing the d, r and period. Perhaps it is
A holdover from my Hollywood days, this type of vanity.
Most folks ’round here are down home, ain’t
Trying to be fancy or flashy or wave
Advanced degrees like Old Glory, mutter those damn
Yankees think they better, but always curious,
Look to see who’s at the wheel, roar their F150
Oversized engines and saddle alongside my car to peer
Right into this brown girl’s smile.
~Pamela Taylor © 2013
The Secret of Saturn
What is it about you
that drives men mad
building spacecraft
to traverse the impossible
space of this universe
just to be close enough
to read your wavelengths,
to reach through magnetic
fields and swirling dust
that shroud you in mystery,
to glimpse the heat rising
from pole to pole—the source
of your power, your storms—
and hope your light bursts forth?
~Pamela Taylor © 2013
Lessons in Virtue
~for Liana
Today you learned courage
as you slid down the 10th grade
hall to geometry class and back
to the principal’s office to retrieve
your forgotten shoes, the cold
plastic floor burning a hole
through patterned socks.
Today you learned restraint,
to show the sullen, pale face
of teenage nonchalance, to bury
shame behind a care-less shrug
as the bite of that told-you-a-million-
times scolding bore into you.
You have yet to learn about prudence
or planning ahead or rows of shoes
on racks by the front door or why
adults make you feel wrong
when they are right.
But this will teach you
the emptiness of justice,
the absence of your mother’s
charity, faith, and love.
~Pamela L. Taylor © 2013
When Doubts Creep In
You sit
in that chair—
a still life
a life still—
staring
into the black
of yourself.
Are you stuck
or have you
stopped
believing you can
tilt the world
on its axis
with your right
pinky toe
and soar?
~Pamela L. Taylor © 2013
Ladybugs in November
They shelter indoors, break in through
uncaulked cracks in windows, searching
of a warm place for their last days.
At first, these tiny prowlers crawl along crown
molding or buzz against the rim
of the pendant light in the dining room.
Sometimes I glimpse them in mid-flight,
spotted domes spread, thin brown wings
soaring on the last heated air of the season.
Soon they’ll appear at eye level, teetering
along bathroom walls and mirrors in haphazard
circles like the town drunk you can’t send home.
When the nights dip toward freezing, I pretend
not to see them clinging to the back splash
or creeping below on vanity doors, bright
against the stark white of cabinets.
Why must I gather upturned bodies,
return their abandoned shells to dust?
~ Pamela Taylor © 2013
A Poet's Double Life 