Surface Tension
what is the surface tension
of water that rises
before a storm
that great heave of breath
right
at
the
tipping
point
before breakwater
and beach
conceded the flood
what begets her
saturation point
when enough
is too much to bear?
Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Lip Twitch (So Sayeth Dr. Google)
caffeine
specifically: caffeine intoxication
mixed brain signals
(i.e. pandemic, politics, Putin)
[insert opening scene from Jaws]
STRESS!
fight or flight!
fight or flight!
fight or flight!
drugsnarcotics
potassium deficiency
hormone deficiency
(fuck you menopause)
parathyroid
(paragliding accident?)
(guilty of too much paraphrasing?)
hemifacial spasm
Bell’s palsy
Trauma
Tourette Syndrome
Parkinson’s Disease
ALS
TUMOR!
“Takeaway: Lip twitching is normally harmless.”
Image: Mouth (Brigitte Bardot’s Lips) by Gerhard Richter. Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Morning Respite from the Fray
Tempest at 3
with winds that
blew away dreams
but saved the tree
left us writing
by lamplight
and you
wanting to play —
how you love a good shadow
love the tease of a pen
on paper scratching —
until day broke
our moment
the beast arose
chased the tempest
back from the day
its tasks now swollen
and barely as sweet.
Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
One of a Thousand Lives
One sea gull drops its catch on the rocks
and I think there’s a poem in that
but only the names have changed
since I last wrote a poem about the
one sea gull, its catch, and those rocks
that can be seen from the house
I thought for sure we’d buy
when it was for sale,
the year I wrote that poem about
the sea gull, its catch, and rocks
There was room there for
his design studio
and my writing space
for my art supplies
and his art collection — mostly Cape Cod,
our shared heart space —
He knew the artists’ names
looked up the owners of our house
they were artists too
and that life oh that life
was as beautiful then as this morning
the seagull having breakfast on the rocks
and I, in starshine, nostalgic
Photo by Kunal Baroth/Pexels. Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
God: The Anthropocene Interview, Part I
I will miss
the birds most,
said God
when asked.
He, like all of us,
has been wondering
about things.
Wondering if a
pandemic
is natural cause
and effect, or
defense mechanism?
Wondering if evil
simply becomes itself,
or rises from the ashes
of what could have been?
Wondering how He
became the excuse
for so much violence
and unkindness?
Wondering what
“act of god” or
“mass destruction”
equates to a
serious reckoning?
Wondering why He
gave the most complex brain
to homo sapiens and not,
for example,
the osprey, the robin,
the starling, the crow?
Photo by Kunal Baroth/Pexels. Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
ON EASTER
It occurred to me
that an apt solution
might be to go sit
in a daffodil patch —
sink deep into the dirt,
commune with
the immortal blooms
that once grew
in Elysian fields,
become heaven myself,
rise to the occasion
or if not —
just return
again next year
hope a long sleep
yields sun
and sustenance.
Photo & Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
I’m sleeping with ghosts again —
my shapeshifters life savers
throw me a line in a dream
Here! Here!
they lie down beside me
curl into my spine
rest a hand, lend a shoulder
faces clear as always
voices, laughs
I know you.
They are my familiars
taking shape and form
as Comfort and Consolation
reminders
of love spent and saved
stored in a cupboard
with sheets —
eye holes to see me
clear as always
buoyant
in memories
Photo by Ron Lach/Pexels. Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
don’t save me from this morning
birdsong catches
at my hem this morning
pulls me into the light
I saw the light,
said the twenty-something
at the diner yesterday
I saw the light and I was saved
he used the word 8 times
while I ate my burger
saved from sins of the flesh
(irony there)
saved from celebrating too much
saved from loving too much
saved from seeing god
in the birdsong
that catches at my hem
Do you think Jesus was a vegeterian?
Do you think he danced with the disciples?
Made love? Oh! Holy! Night!
It’s sad to be so sure at 20 (so convinced)
leaves little room for magic
on mornings like this
and little room to dance
Photo & Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
DREAM 4.13.22
I rub his bare belly
like a Buddha
it’s smooth and firm
and warm
he laughs
as a secret
street lights
stop lights
moon light
shows a face
I shouldn’t see
and I wake
hot
and tangled
wondering
if it’s just good fortune
or an explanation
of more than
I can grasp
Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Dashboard light tells me
tank empty, you’re out of gas
Dashboard light…you’re right
Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
NOT TODAY
There isn’t a poem today.
My mother bit it off
and chewed on it.
She hadn’t had her lunch,
She hadn’t slept well,
She was frustrated and angry,
today, last week, last year
when I was 15,
so she bit down hard
forgetting all of the idioms
the hands
the wolf
the bed
left me to tend to the wound
when I was 15,
last year, last week, today
I’m too tired to write a poem.
Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
MEANT TO SHINE
For Max
in the yard
the flowers glow at night
you can follow the path of a snail
there’s fairy fire
in the old man’s crook
and sparks in the belly of a whale
in the sky
the sun does yeoman’s work
as it polishes half the moon
and the stars
they glimmer on for us
their facets roughly hewn
good heavens,
all the world’s afire
if we only take the time
to look up from our
whirligigs
and see the vast sublime
Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
Protego Totalum
When the healer asked at my illness
I explained
the permeable membrane
that is my heart space —
how compassion
and empathy have
always been allowed
free and unlimited egress
it is the mark of a good girl
a good daughter
a good sister
a good Catholic
to a fault, a good person
to a fault and this time
to a gait hobbled by the weight
by too much give, and not enough take
And so she prescribed for me
a Protego Totalum,
a silent incantation
complete with a swish and a flick
that seals up the leaks,
and saves the good for healing.
Poem ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
OVERNIGHT
It rained all night
and I sunk into dreams
so deeply, I left a worn spot
like deer in a meadow,
magic and memory
crushed beneath
a weary soul
weaving milkweed threads
for warmth,
the star a lantern
to light her path
to morning.
Poem & Photo ©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
THE MUSES KEPT KNOCKING
Not today, I told them
I don’t need what you’re selling.
I’ve got no pedigree,
I’m just a worker bee
and I don’t bow to the queen.
Not today.
But they wouldn’t let up.
So I let them in enough
to take a message —
a first line, a title, an idea.
Stuffed it all in a folder
and went on to other things.
Not today, I told them
I don’t need what you’re selling.
I don’t teach
I don’t preach
And I don’t have a voice.
Not one that counts.
So, not today.
But they wouldn’t let up.
I’m a fake.
It’s a mistake.
I don’t have what it takes.
No, no — not today.
But they wouldn’t let up.
Not at all, not once.
So I opened the door,
and the windows some more,
and out came my first poem in months.
Poem©2022, Jen Payne. Painting, Open Door, Brittany, by Henri Matisse. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
UNTETHERED
I am girl on the moon
present
and accounted for
you even see me sometimes
half the time
but I lose footing
more often than I should
feel weightless
meaningless
not much holds me fast
keeps me in place
things come and things go
round and round
round and round
but I suppose we’re all spinning
these days
find ourselves on the dark side
watching for something to hold onto
Poem©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
LOST PLEASURES
the view from room 217 as the sun rises
her laugh
the longevity of certain conversations
and certain daydreams
silence
the fact that he knew how to cook (ribs)
and our Sunday mornings
the nostalgia of comfort foods and ample wine
how she understood me with a nod
the shade of pines after the first hill
(before the storm)
being unreachable, there
or anywhere
things to believe in
belonging
Poem©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
SCREEN PORCH SOLO
My cat on the screen porch
is meyowling sing-song
with the birds,
a chorus of Cardinal
and Crow and Grackle
Jay, Jay, Jay
and Lola…
Meyowwwwl
Meyowwwwl
Meyowwwwl
It’s spring fever on the screen porch
and she in a sunbeam spotlight
plays center stage.
Poem©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
LOOK, UP IN THE SKY…
It was hard to miss,
though I did wonder
if anyone else
saw in awe
the two turkeys
up in a tree
their awkward
balancing act
on the finger-thin
branches,
the safety dance
of neck and wings
the fulcrum legs
as their resting spot
swayed
and they stayed
the night
safe from all
but my curious sight.
Poem©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
ENCHANTRESS
I have watched her dance
watched her lose herself in a song
among the crowd
on a wet city street
seen her cry
dream
soar through the clouds
guided by only a voice
the rain
a song
a beat
a heartbeat
magic
Poem©2022, Jen Payne. Photo by Heloisa Vecchio on Pexels.com. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
THE SCIENCE OF WOMEN
There are small pink marks
softened with age
that only she will recognize,
knows how they adhere to time
and memory and this odd, shared path.
She has seen me as no one else —
vulnerable, prone, afraid —
allowed trust and autonomy
to dance even step with
training and science.
Partners,
she ages with me now
gray for gray and line for line,
our nods of knowing
the flash, the sweat,
the weight of it all,
speak more than we ever have
in these brief encounters
these long precarious years
of waiting and watching
tell-tale scars fade.
Poem©2022, Jen Payne. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.
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I am sure the red fox wonders,
as does the otter and friends,
what happened to the horizon,
why the light that’s not a star shines
from sun down to sun up
with no seeming purpose,
why the fresh salt air is slow to come
The gulls know, of course
They see from the sky
the new and larger rooftops,
the wide expanses of useless green,
the decks and porches and drives,
the construction constructed from the edge of their pond to the edge of the harbor
They see even, in the biggest living room
of the biggest house
the big screen TV,
which,
on certain mornings,
lights the horizon just like a sun,
casts shadows on the fox
and the otter
who will never know again
the rush of first light and certain breezes.
It was just the other summer day
I wondered if your hair turned gray.
If you loved her still enough to stay.
And then as if in cue today,
I saw your car pass my way.
That telltale glance gave you away,
the smile that always could betray.
And I, with so much left to say,
kept still and let this poem aweigh.
Alive without breath,
As cold as death;
Never thirsty, ever drinking,
All in mail never clinking.
My nephew, fresh from the pages of Tolkien,
sees a fish carcass on the beach,
predicts Gollum! though we both wonder.
He considers the waves left from a storm,
the wind that blows us each askew,
thinks with furrowed brow, like me
as I sift through those things I know:
the trespass of raw sewage
and slick film of leached oil,
the change of warming waters,
our persistent lack of rain.
But he’s off on a new adventure now,
throwing boulders with grunts and gasps,
Take that! he yells, a holler into the wind
as loud as mine would be if allowed
to grieve the things he cannot see.
a deconstructed garden
the secondary scents
or quieter facets of floristry
often overlooked:
freshly cut stems,
crushed leaves,
rich soil
as beautiful and evocative as the flower itself
what lingers
green hyacinth and dewy muguet
mandarin, hyacinth, freesia
molecules
radiance
sensuality
This morning before dawn I found myself
looking for black pants in the dark.
In the dark before dawn,
I was looking for black pants
and found it apt metaphor
that search in the dark
for hope when it’s so hard to see
as hard to see as black in the dark
that search for hope
that’s hard to see, these days
these days and most days,
black as the dark before dawn
an outstretched hand unseen
in the dark, this morning, with hope.
FRIENDS 2020
I miss the taken-for-granted pleasure of soft butter spread on another piece of bread at my favorite restaurant,
how it complements the white wine served in a chilled glass so well I could have a meal of just that: bread, butter, wine.
I miss the face of my friend across the table from me, less than six feet for sure, her uncovered smile,
the back and forth of gestures, nods, hands-in-the-air exclamations about all of those things:
making art! writing! travel!
a heron, hummingbird, bee!
life and love…and that bread, can you believe it!
I miss our slow, slow pace that lasts longer than a meal, almost sometimes longer than a shift,
as we nod our gratitude to the waitress who knows us by smiles and gestures that say
yes, pour more wine
yes, leave more butter, please
yes, yes more bread of course, more bread
when the only thing that covers our face is the brief glance at a menu
or the swipe of a linen napkin to wipe a crumb from a smile never again taken for granted.
And so it goes.
I once left a man because he used my toothbrush.
I was young of course, but it wasn’t the face value indiscretion that caused the sudden severing,
it was the implications: swerving across lines of trust, respect, kindness.
We wonder where love goes, how friendships end, how communities falter and countries fail.
It’s in the small and everyday: the one false move that tips the scale too far, too much.
In the blink of an eye we’re careening across the median, crashing into something hard and unyielding,
spitting what’s left down the drain, and praying the tap still works to wash away the betrayal.
And so it goes. Like that. Just as complicatedly simple as that.
Projecting
It’s OK, I reassure her.
You’re alright.
Seemingly all day
I talk out loud
Where are you?
Are you OK?
Yesterday, she startled
when I walked into the room
both of us unaware of the other
It’s OK I reassure her
and You’re alright
but I wonder sometimes
at this grand projection,
is she in possible peril
or am I?
New Leaf
Oh for the new leaf turning,
the new chapter beginning,
the door closing
silently, silently, silently
the window opens
ohhhhh for the new leaf turning…
Sims 2020
If one if familiar
with the virtual world
of the Sims,
then one well knows
how task = reward.
One must
work work work
to earn money,
and
read read read
to gain intelligence (points).
Don’t forget to
talk talk talk
and
smile smile smile
to make friends.
It’s important to
wash wash wash
to keep healthy (points),
and
exercise exercise, too.
All of this, this, this
to maintain the house you
built, built, built,
the relationship
for which you
kissed, kissed, kissed,
and your
happy happy mood.
So if one is familiar
with the world
of the Sims,
then one well knows
how virtually similar
these 2020 days
feel, feel, feel.
Testing 1 2 3
To Live Alone in the Woods
and Write, Wild She Goes
for Nan
I rise up from my Sunday recline
long enough to select a proper bookmark
for surely this story deserves better
than a torn and tattered scrap
from the used bookstore, used
deserves, perhaps, a bookmark
made by an artist friend
from cut paper instead —
attended, intricate, precious
intended for just this…
this intricate story cut
from words and time
from memory and nerve
cut from the heart
There was snow
and she was her usual
ornery self about the matter —
I don’t like snow
in a sweet huffy fit
mirroring her petulant
I don’t like trees
when she’d sneeze.
How I miss all of that,
but I digress…
There was snow
and she was her usual:
the smile-and-laugh
approach to hard hard life,
a big and bold disguise
a wink even, I think,
and then she left.
She left and then
the living room light
turned on by itself
lit from a beam of sun
she never saw coming
coming through the window
then the radio lit for morning…
Tell me all your thoughts on God
‘Cause I’m on my way to see her
In the pieces of memory
and scraps of conversations
transcribed in situ
I will tell you about
the headless groom
and the dead dog,
about the failure of Saint Raphael
and the irony of the phrase
“you could get hit by a bus.”
I’ll tell you the 15,000 words that broke me
and the ones that almost put me back together
until I realized my heart was better
cracked wide-open like that anyhow.
Now all I need to do is type
Happy Ending.
on the last page
and hope it will suffice.
randomactsofwriting.net