Safer Than This (Day 391)

I wish the world felt 

safer than this 

where, every evening, 

I lay my head amidst 

a firestorm of wild mustangs, 

steely hooves trailing sparks, 

thundering without warning 

down the narrow, 

perfumed path that 

no longer bears the weight 

of my few belongings

where yellowing bottles 

of laudanum dreams 

offer an ease, akin to 

daylight’s first soft fingers 

tickling my cheek, warm 

as laughter under the covers, 

last night’s violet silk 

shimmying on the bedpost 

in a lingering echo of smoke 

and dancehall jazz 

where hungry wolves, 

roused from their dens 

in the frozen woods, pace 

through the long, winter nights

—their claws puncturing 

the tense, icy crust 

with each step—waiting for me 

to emerge into the cold

(c) 2018, by Hannah Six

Image: Bhakti2/Pixabay

Cat Haiku (Day 369)

Beloved bittersweet

Enchantingly velutinous 

This bewhiskered bundle

(c) 2018, by Hannah Six

Note to worrywarts (like me): Charley played Muse today. He is perfectly fine! 

Stalk (Day 334)

here  so delicately 

breaking that bright green

tendril  the interloper  

stalks swagging thick  

swarming over branches left 

sweating in water-air  dribbling 

into depths of dromedary 

bliss  learn deeply 

to kiss this odd laughing 

fountain  look back like catfish 

after dark  learning that neither 

crickets nor fireflies glow 

here  so delicately 

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Image: GSmith via Wikimedia Commons

When Service Begins (Day 332)

When service begins, she is looking to her right, at an ostentatiously pious, balding man and his younger wife, who seems ill at ease. Whether she dislikes being in church or simply being next to her husband is difficult to say.

In California, she thinks, looking out at the wilderness of the unmown field next door, everything, even church, is more comfortable, natural and easy.

The little boy just in front of her just turned seven, and can’t open his hymnal to the right page. When his mother reaches over to help, he jerks the book and turns away, wanting to do it himself. His mother sighs audibly, and a tiny surge of annoyance ripples through their neighbors.

Looking to her left, now: A very large, very rude woman, who never sits in the rear, though she always arrives late, and who, every week, manufactures an opportunity to proclaim herself one of the few Native Californians in the congregation. 

Since moving here with her son, weekends have been lonely. It is hard to meet people, when everyone spends so much time in their cars, commuting and running errands. Always, sitting in traffic. 

At first, she actually tried walking to the grocery store. But, in that brief quarter-mile, she attracted so many pitying glances and offers of rides or assistance that she, too, took to her car.

The woman next to her settles back and relaxes, her thighs spreading a bit as she does. It’s a comforting feeling, this sudden body contact. Anyway, she thinks, wouldn’t it seem antisocial, somehow, to pull away too soon?

When the service ends, she is glad to step into the glare of the parking lot. It feels so good, relaxing her face, not having to smile any longer.

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Stained Glass Window, St Michael's Church Linlithgow

cc-by-sa/2.0 - © Dr Richard Murray - geograph.org.uk/p/1915135