Wrapping Yarn - 5:31 am

Some mornings, this morning
I wake wrapped in helplessness.
Pain is. Tsunamis crash. War rage
Friends suffer. Diseases progress.
Clients give up. Death waits. Or doesn't.
I sit in bed, listen to my beloved breathe.
I know our days are numbered.
I cannot know their number.
I open bag of soft blue yarn, six skeins.
I wrap them into six neat blue balls.
Chances are the sun will rise and I
I will riise too and do what I can do.

Because I Do

Because I Do

I write when I don't feel like writing
because I am a writer
and writers write. Writers write.
I write with difficulty when I must
because I trust that when I write
with no inspiration, no motivation
I invite the energy, the mystery
that will eventually wake me
with cloudburst, songburst
of tuneful heartfelt words..
I write because I am a writer
and writers write. Writers write..
.
Victoria Hendricks
March 14, 2011

Up Too Late

I should sleep.
I need to be strong in the morning.
smart in the morning, awake, alert.
I treasure quiet house,
thoughts moving slower,
anxiety less intense.
I do not want to give up
up peace for sleep.

Victoria Hendricks
March 13, 2011

Can't Fake Strength

Can't fake strength.
Can doubt its presence,
resent need that demands
tap root reach deep source
Can pant, weep, curse, fear,
worry, wail, falter exhausted.
Strength comes when called
Does what needs doing.
Can't fake strength.

Victoria Hendricks
March 6, 2011

Winter White

Wisconsin, end of winter
world lays white horizon
to horizon, earth, sky,
Trees' black skeletons show
no promise of bud or leaf.
Color migrated with the warblers.
I must take it on faith snow
will melt, grass push up,
blossoms burst, color return.

Victoria Hendricks
March 6, 2011

Stripes

Prisoner of war
carries stripes of lash
on back all his days,
inescapble even
when hidden by
most expensive
silk shirt. My
own stripes,
yours, less visible
equally inescapable.

Sudden Death

I just found out by email
father of 11 year old boy,
son of online friend, husband
business man, church deacon
died suddenly Wednesday.
He was 39, still in summertime,
I will fashion soft knitting into
a heart warmer, add a cross button,
send it to his mother with a card,
It will not be enough. It will help.
I don't know what suffering took him.
Illness too strong,trauma too intense,
darkness too deep, hatred or mistake.
Death comes on her own terms
came for him, will come for me.
I will give my daughter an extra kiss.
All we can to is live and love tonight.

Victoria Hendricks
February 24, 1011