Rocks at Pray

I received this image from a friend via email. Tilt your head to the left to view.

2 Poems: The Prodigal Son Returns Home and Joshua

The Prodigal Son Returns Home

6'4". 220 pounds.

He fills up my apartment with the smell of his cheap cologne tinged
with just the slightest trace of tobacco.
His dirty white socks hide under the ottoman; one, grey, dingy heel peeking out.
His black, leather kit with the Raider emblem rests on my bathroom counter; toothpaste, floss, nail clippers, a clear, cylinder-shaped case of toothpicks, and one shiny, Trojan packet spilling out.

In two days time he's already gone through a gallon of whole milk, two heads of lettuce,
a bowl of fruit, two pots of pasta, and half the meat in my freezer.

I hear him laughing on his cell phone, "Hey Dawg, I'm in town. Whudja doin'?"

My solitude is shattered; my sensibilities shaken by the blatant presence of testosterone.
But my heart is soft.

"Mommy," he yells. "What's for dinner?"

© Birdstory Publications 2005


Joshua

"I love you a whole bunch," I say.
"I know." he says
and runs off to watch TV.
I hear him singing with Mr. Rogers.

He wants peanut-butter
and jelly sandwiches
for lunch
the eighth day in a row.
Separate knives for jelly and butter.
With a child's precision
he quarters his sandwich
into crumbs.

He paints
brilliant blue on newsprint
on the table
on the floor
sky splattered on the wall.

Quiet time, we lay down together
fingering quilts.
He presses his back
into my stomach.
His eyelids close,
ears flush pink.
His heart beats
against the palm of my hand.

My shirt is moist
from his sleeping sweat.
I close my eyes too.

© 1989

All the News That's Fit To Print - Oops, I Meant - All the Bullshit the Bush Administration Has Put Forth! (And other miscellaneous news items)

Out of touch with the news for a few days...my son sustained an injury to his eye, requiring me to hop a flight to Phoenix, hang out in the hospital for two days (the kid - a 21-year-old going on 13 - had surgery and is now the proud owner of a thin, titanium plate replacing his lower lobe - the bone that essentially keeps your eyeball from drifting down into your cheek), and then bring him home, so I can supervise his "recovery." The kid received a wild and powerful punch to his right eye (from a thug who was breaking into his sister's car - the kid took matters into his own hands; why call the police when you're 6'4" and a tough guy?).

I read the NYT on the plane back to SFO and then after arriving home and getting the kid safely stashed in the big, comfy chair in the living room, ice pack on eye and remote control in hand, I fished for news on the Internet.

I was shocked, dismayed, surprised by what I read. How could that be? I am, after all, totally jaded and cynical now.

Could it be the two-day news reprieve softened me, or could it be that worrying about my son for two days shifted my point-of-view about the world? I couldn't believe what I read and saw - the idiocy, the stupidity of our government officials, the self-serving manipulation of our President - how could I be shocked? But I was:



From the AP newswire, I believe, we have this fetching photo of our beloved President striding with firefighters; note how he is rolling up his sleeves (because of course, he is going to help out and get down to it - really pitch in and get this rescue job moving along). Note also that he is drafting - striding just a bit behind the firefighters so their energy, their power, can pull him along. And yes, these firefighters were dispatched for photo op duty (see this article in the Salt Lake Tribune - http://www.sltrib.com/utah/ci_300497.


The article tells the tale of how highly skilled and trained firefighters, plucked from their hometowns where no doubt their services were not required at all, were dispatched to Louisiana to what they believed would be a rescue mission, only to sit all day in a seminar on sexual harassment and racism, then informed that their mission is to seek out survivors and hand them a FEMA information slip, certainly an effective use of the firefighters' expertise. Oh, yeah, and of course, another part of their function is to act as photo props for our dear President. But all in the line of duty you know. (Check out this blog - I received the link in email and as you can see, it definately has influenced my take on the above photo and article: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/9/6/233139/2154.)

And then of course, the grandfolks visited those poor, poor people in the Astrodome, where dear Barbara provided us all with a quote sure to go down in infamy: "And so many people in the arena here, you know, are underprivileged anyway, so this - this is working very well for them."
Well heck yeah! Of course it's working well for those poor folk. I'm sure they are down on their knees in gratitude that Mother Nature came through and destroyed their lives and their government failed to implement a well-planned and thoughtful evacuation and rescue mission, and that now, they have this wonderful opportunity to live temporarily in a super-stadium and then be dispersed throughout the nation to various locations where they'll have to start all over (still in abject poverty, because after all, funding for social programs has been slashed under the Bush administration and no doubt, the funding allocated for Katrina relief will go to uncompetitive and overpriced bids by multibillion-dollar corporations who will profit enormously from the rebuilding) - yeah, that'll work out just fine for those folks. (http://www.smh.com.au./news/world/barbara-bush-comments-on-survivors-spark-outrage/2005/09/07/1125772563296.html?oneclick=true .

And of course I caught up a bit on Iraq (all bad) and Afghanistan (bad) and learned that the UN has released their annual world-wide poverty report and our government, along with Japan, is the stingiest government on the planet in terms of providing aid to poor nations. Yes, we give the most amount, but per capita we are misers compared to other countries.

God bless America.

What? Me lead?