Living Sparsely

I was only gathering up things
to save.
They were evidence
of the time and place.
I was saving them
for proof that it was
really that good.

I was watching the splash
of thick raindrops
on paved walkways.
And smelling the cleanness
of the rain.

I was listening to the
rush of wind through pine
trees and the groan of
aspen shifting
their weight
as golden coinage
fell to the ground
about autumn.

I was tasting the
cool water as it
flowed from the red pump
and satisfying thirst
for the ages.

I was only
ingesting the words
in the order in which
they were written,
and the feeling of
the weight and the woven
cloth spine of the book
escaped me as I absorbed
the pages.

I was savoring quiet
minutes and hours to
use for hard times
I did not know
would come.

It was instinct,
survival
to collect
and sort them,
shelving them
to take out when
needed.

Yes, I had eaten well
and my belly had been full.
Yes, dreams cushioned my
nights, safe and warm.
Yes, the sounds of the
cooing dove assured and
soothed me a thousand times.

I only took what I needed
and I shared what I could.

(c) Nita Walker Boles

Why the Sun Comes Up Every Day (c) Nita Walker Boles

She stands clad in
gossamer white,
her hair a sea of
wheated waves all
billowing round her
shoulders.

She waits at the crossing
a chasm away
split by time and space
her voice echoing
from the past
just this side of
yesterday.

She goes to places obscured
by obsidian and quartz
unparalleled in this
universe,
where I cannot see
and there she learns
what I cannot know
while I
stand peering
for any glimpse
of her
shadow.

I feel the gnawing
away
of time,
through the filter of
sunny days and balmy nights
not to
exclude the weathering of
wind and the wrinkling
of skin.

I will be forced to
go through untold
happiness without
her, admitting truthfully
to God
and man that it was not
complete desolation with her gone.

In the torture of my
gladness for the good
left in life,
I will betray her
over and over as I
rock the babies of
her brothers and sisters
and feel thankful
for them.

And secretly I will
take heart that she
is not forgotten,
that she is missed
when I hear how
her closest of friends
wept over the likeness
of her image in
her sister's daughter.

So, it seems,
she is not forgotten,
I say coyly to myself.
So, I say, it is not
just me who
misses her face,
her laughter,
her eyes, her hair.

I turn back to my
weaving, plucking
the strands of
memories,
setting the waft and
pulling the
warp to be
sure the pattern is
set: We will not
forget this
Daughter of Light.

All the while
I am working
and working
to weave a bit of
cloth with many names
engraved, with
stories all told
the best they could
be and at the end
of mine,
she waits for me.

On Feeding Oneself

“Why don’t you
write?”
she said.

She was my
beloved
literature prof.

In her hand
was a fistful
of papers
with my words
trailing
across them.

“Because I have
to feed my children.”
I said.

I took the papers
from her hand
and ate them.

They weren’t
that good,
anyway.

So I went off
to the salt
mines of
the world.

I fed and
clothed my
children
by the sweat
of my
brow.

In time,
my belly
began to
ache.

The words
were going
to have
to come
out.

I cried to God
“Let me write
else I die!”
like Rachel
to Jacob.

Only Jacob was
not God.
I had gone to
the right
Person.

In time

I began
to tell
people
that
I
wrote.

It was
like
coming
out of
the closet.

Some
of them
still
talk to me.


©Nita Walker Boles

Unpacking

Putting away bags and clothes,
some unwashed
with pieces of
Colorado in the pockets.

Standing and looking
through walls
at scenes invisible here.

Trying to explain
what I saw, where it was,
to disinterested parties
occupied with other things.

Regaining some
sense of motion in
the everyday when in fact
the world starts and
stops where there
is red soil.

Forensic scientists years from now
examining my clothing
and shoes find traces
and evidence
I was not really from
this place.

In my belongings
too many things
suggesting a connection to
evergreens and aspen,
river-washed stone and rose quartz.

(c) Nita Walker Boles

Lamentation for My Father

From your
portrait
liquid
with
life’s pigments

I saw
your Nemesis
appear
in black
and white.

I saw
the shadow
of your
shadow
steal
the colors
from my sight.


©Nita Walker Boles

Soujourn to Vallhalla

My craft takes me
through
swift waters
to places
I am wont
to go.

In the distance
now is heard
the drone
of the
mourners.

My ears
strain at the
sound of
their dirge.

With their cymbals
and
their drums
they will
beat out
the days of
your life.


With their chants
they will
tell of the
worth
of your being.

In their waters
I will
wash my silent
sorrow
until all
their voices cease,
until all their
instruments
have no sound.

My brother,
my brother.
How shall I
walk the
earth
without you?

After a thousand
suns have
risen
and every eagle
has flown free,
after I am
quenched,

I will cross
the waters
and
depart this place
with your
name
on my lips.

© Nita Walker Boles

With Appologies to Eugene Field

Our ship was
blown on heaving
waves to
this place frozen
in time.
We awakened from
childhood slumber
to find ourselves
here,
and fully grown.

We marveled at
how life could
go on
so easily around
us on ground
hallowed
by our
childhood.

It was not
sentiment
nor fairy dust
that caused
the golden
light
by which
we saw,
but new
awareness
of reality.

Brothers and
sisters,
sisters and
brothers.
I was in your
lives and you
were in mine
when we
walked on
wooden
floors.

Each night
we slept,
our bellies
full with the
meat of
childhood
play.

Until one
by one
we boarded
the ship
that took
us all away.

© Nita Walker Boles