Tag: Love

Things I Shouldn’t

~ Deb ~ Leave a comment 
Sometimes I think things I shouldn’t, and
I wonder if I’m helping them come
true.  I’ve heard that our thoughts become
what the world looks like through

our eyes, and I believe that for the 
most part.  But what about the horror
writers?  Is Stephen King’s mind 
filled with terror?  Is he afraid?  Haunted

by his own imagination? Is the dystopia
we live in all Margaret Atwood’s fault
for imagining it in the first place? Where
is the line between holding our fear just

long enough to heal it and creating a world
we never wanted? I need to know, because
sometimes I think things I shouldn’t. Like when
I imagine what life would be like if you were

gone.  One day, we will say goodbye for the
last time, and chances are, we won’t even
know it.  When I get your text -- “Home. Thanks
for everything” -- only then do I realize that

my breathing has been shallow for eight 
hours while you’ve been on the road.
And I am able to forget again that one 
day we will have to say goodbye for

real. I am safe in my home and you in
yours, and I can imagine that we will
see each other at Christmas, like we 
have for half a century or more, and we 

can pretend that we always will have 
another Christmas or another visit and
I can forget that sometimes I think things
I shouldn’t. 


© 2020 Deb Moore, All Rights Reserved

The Middle Age

~ Deb ~ Leave a comment 
I have a predilection for melancholy,
a generous bent toward nostalgia,
and I surrender completely to 
isolated flashes of memory 
in the gloaming. 

I’ve spent hours in meditation,
bending toward the present,
then settling into a place
of peaceful nothingness
in the moment.

I’ve loved so many ways,
the love of blood, and the
love of heart, and the love
of so much more and 
so much less.

I’ve aged into a life I like,
a daily rhythm that fits
a soul like mine, that craves 
both experience and time 
to write it.

I am middle-aged, no longer
a tree climber or a speed demon,
no longer willing to play fast
and loose with your heart
or mine.  

I have learned the lessons of
my time, and I have become
less of what I wanted and 
more of what I needed, 
and I’m happy.

But sometimes in the half-light
of dusk (one can’t meditate
every moment) I think of 
days long gone, and I 
remember you.  

© 2020 Deb Moore,  All Rights Reserved

Juxtaposition

~ Deb ~ 2 Comments

So many years
went by when I
didn’t write a word.
Half-finished novels
stuck in exposition.
Protagonists just
setting off on a
hero’s journey,
frozen in mid-stride.

Poems written on scraps
tucked into notebooks
piled in boxes
stacked in a closet.
Epic tales told
in snippets.
Odes to odes.
16-syllable haiku.
13-line sonnets.

Songs, short stories,
essays, comedy routines.
Journals filled for
20 pages,
or 30,
then abandoned,
the thread
picked up later
in another journal.
Eleven journals
covering thirty years,
each with a month here
and a month there
from disconnected years.
A life, cross-indexed. 

But I was busy
teaching people
how to write. 

And when I would come home
from this noble endeavor,
I paid the mortgage and
kept the lights on
and bought the kibble
and gardened
and watched sunsets
from the porch
with you.  

It was this hero’s journey,
a living poetry.
Story after story
I finished.
Whole chapters
on which I
closed whole
books.  

I don’t regret
abandoned manuscripts.
I would, however,
regret missing
a sunset
on the porch
with you.  

© 2020 Deb Moore, All Rights Reserved

Routine

~ Deb ~ Leave a comment

Office reruns in bed

late at night

(Jim plans a prank)

We laugh so

hard we have to

pause the show

We catch our breath

You press play again

My toes reach for yours

under covers

You play 

a game online

Me, a crossword puzzle

(Dwight planning Jim’s demise)

My right hand clutches

pen and book

My left reaches for

your fingers

gripped on your phone

I stroke the back

of your hand

(Jim grins at the camera)

Subtly, not suggestive

You say nothing

But I see you

smile

© 2020 Deb Moore, All Rights Reserved