Hurry

 

the marvelous women :: mohja kahf

All women speak two languages:
the language of men
and the language of silent suffering.
Some women speak a third,
the language of queens.
They are marvelous
and they are my friends.

My friends give me poetry.
If it were not for them
I’d be a seamstress out of work.
They send me their dresses
and I sew together poems,
enormous sails for ocean journeys.

My marvelous friends, these women
who are elegant and fix engines,
who teach gynecology and literacy,
and work in jails and sing and sculpt
and paint the ninety-nine names,
who keep each other’s secrets
and pass on each other’s spirits
like small packets of leavening,

it is from you I fashion poetry.
I scoop up, in handfuls, glittering
sequins that fall from your bodies
as you fall in love, marry, divorce,
get custody, get cats, enter
supreme courts of justice,
argue with God.

You rescuers on galloping steeds
of the weak and the wounded–
Creatures of beauty and passion,
powerful workers in love–
you are the poems.
I am only your stenographer.
I am the hungry transcriber
of the conjuring recipes you hoard
in the chests of your great-grandmothers.

My marvelous friends–the women
of brilliance in my life,
who levitate my daughters,
you are a coat of many colors
in silk tie-dye so gossamer
it can be crumpled in one hand.
You houris, you mermaids, swimmers
in dangerous waters, defiers of sharks–

My marvelous friends,
thirsty Hagars and laughing Sarahs,
you eloquent radio Aishas,
Marys drinking the secret
milkshakes of heaven,
slinky Zuleikas of desire,
gay Walladas, Harriets
parting the sea, Esthers in the palace,
Penelopes of patient scheming,

you are the last hope of the shrinking women.
You are the last hand to the fallen knights
You are the only epics left in the world

Come with me, come with poetry
Jump on this wild chariot, hurry–

Boston 100 Word Story

 The Crossing

Route 9 on my way toward Northeastern. Sometimes it's a benign trip--paperwork. Trains, cars, ambulances jostle near Beth Israel. I accelerate past the Mission Bar. Or a red light halts me, a blessing. I see my Dad. I had stolen a wheelchair. Have you hefted a wheelchair across T-tracks through a deadly intersection with your father in your palms? He sipped water. I nursed iced-tea. After the diagnosis, he returned to Kansas with a fatal disease. Now I idle in my car; I can smile at our audacity. I can tell the story. The stark terror of his crossing.

A City is Just a City

Our family outgrew our red brick house at 3005 Cornell Drive, an address whose pleasing rhyme still delights me. By the time I was nearing kindergarten, the search commenced. My father would pile several kids in the car on Sunday afternoons to investigate properties on the outskirts of Hutchinson. I loved being part of the important work to find the right place for us. The distances felt epic. The rippling prairie grass and the stately, gnarled cottonwood trees stretched as far as I could see. We hunted for a place to have a custom-built house to suit a family of eight. It was the summer of 1978.

My father passed away in 2013 from a rare, savage disease which took him quickly. We mourned him at Holy Cross Church and buried him at Memorial Park Cemetery, a grave I don’t visit often enough. My trips home to Hutch grew infrequent and then halted during the pandemic. If I could visit his grave today, I would ask him about those drives into the countryside on sleepy Sunday afternoons. I am sure he had lists and charts with property values and construction estimates. He must have labored for hours on the plan to purchase two acres and build a home. He can’t answer now. I can imagine, however, his pleasure in the project and the stress as well. To hear his voice telling the story would be a balm.

Those Sunday drives bouncing on a backseat with my brother, a few sisters, soon ended. He secured the property. The house was built. More of a white walls kind of man, he nevertheless let the kids select colors for the bedrooms. There was a pale purple room, a cheerful pink, a blue, and a bright yellow. There was space for everyone at the dining room table, the piano bench doubling as a seat for two kids at the end. There was a living room window that faced our front acreage, partly left wild and free, filled with swaying prairie grass. The little ones glued our noses to the front window in agonized anticipation for Dad’s sedan to turn onto our dirt road, sending up clouds of dust. We cried with joy at the sight of his car, rushed to the table, and then waited to say grace. 

I am lucky to have grown up in my family, in that house, in my hometown, Hutchinson. We had a rich family life and our faith and education were deeply invested in Holy Cross Church and the Catholic schools. My father was dedicated to Hutchinson. After his retirement from Dillon’s, he worked with passion and conviction to open Sarah’s Catholic Bookstore on Main Street. He believed in community and being active to build a city into a home for all within its boundaries. A city is just a city unless you work to make it your hometown. My mother still embodies this idea with her civic work. And she still lives in that home my father built.

My mother welcomes us home, all thirty-seven of us, for our summer July 4th reunion. We bring our children and share our Hutchinson heritage: the fireworks, the parade on Main Street, a flawless donut (or two) from Daylight Donuts, a buffet feast at The Anchor Inn. We cheer for the Monarchs in Dillon Park. The grandkids love the newer additions to Hutch as well, The Alley and Salt City Splash. Dillon Nature Center is always on our list, often for a family celebration. These sites and the flavors will become their generation’s touchstones. We are building memories for them. I know that when they think of Hutchinson, they will recall our family reunion’s traditional late night drive to the pedestrian bridge over K-61 highway.

 My dad used to take us there as kids and let us walk over the highway. We were thrilled with the traffic noise, the hot sun, the metal clang of our footfalls, and the rush of trucks and cars racing beneath us. Now we take our kids to the newly constructed, exceptional pedestrian walkway. They love it. They beg to go. We go under the cover of dark and park at Union Valley School. From there we walk on the sidewalk, winding our way up the ramp with building excitement. Grandma drives her van onto the highway below us. She honks and we wave and shriek with glee. She drives a bit down the highway toward town. She puts on her hazards. She pauses. The kids shout, “No, Grandma! Don’t do it!” When the coast is clear, she brazenly drives across the grass median and returns under the bridge one last time to a chorus of cheers and delighted grandchildren. 

This July, 2022, our reunion felt almost post-pandemic, though some of us still needed to wear masks. Not all of us have had Covid. Despite Covid, the war in Ukraine, and the political divisions in our country, the summer nights were gorgeous. The late afternoon cotton showers gave way to the softer air and blazing sunsets. The fireflies flirted among the prairie grass. The cicadas sang. The hot, dry air that tastes of harvests and hope blew our hair. As I sat on the front steps only one thing marred the evening–the roar of the newly built highway, which invaded my father’s perfect homestead some years ago. My father could not have imagined that the rerouted K-61 would obstruct our Kansas vista. It made me sad to watch the kids play on the front lawn under the bombardment of highway noise instead of under the watchful gaze of their grandpa. However, my kids barely registered the traffic. They were too engaged in another round of an improvised ball game. They didn’t grow up with the deep black nights and the sounds of nature during a Kansas night. This was how they have always known Grandma’s house. A home. 

Top Ten

 Turkish delight

jasmine pearl tea

eyewear

outdoor fruit and vegetable markets

mushrooms

baking bread

being in my body

ukulele lessons 

pockets

giving books I love to people I think might love them too

Rereading The Girl of the Limberlost by Gene Stratton-Porter after more than 35 years, a book my grandmother gave to me

deserted diners

grandma Kelley's rice casserole

Le Mans Hall

midwives

Spencer Tunick

Budapesti Közkincs Könyvtár

clowns

David Byrne’s American Utopia

democracy

church bells

Gellért Fürdő

African chicken and peanut soup from the New England Soup Factory

martini with blue cheese stuffed olives

1059 Riverside

wonderland

gesztenyepüré

Greek yogurt with honey, in Greece

Book Club

Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins

Rome

Batman underwear for grownup women

Indigo Girls

dandelions

sleep

Warren Dunes State Park

The Overstory by Richard Powers

french fries

Ted Kooser

clean pressed sheets

walking by a lilac bush in bloom

holding hands

playgrounds

Paris

NPR

hard wood floors

handmade afghans

coffee

Jeune Homme Nu Assis au Bord de la Mer, by Jean- Hippolyte Flandrin

marching bands

HONK! festival of activist street bands

my clever, funny friend

roasted chestnuts

Duchess Goldblatt 

Asian Monday

Miss Mary, my terrible dog

birdie sing in the tree, woo woo woo, wee wee wee, I love you and you love me

Henszlmann Imre utca, 5

cuckoo clocks

handwritten letters

potluck dinners

Thai massage

Amanda Palmer

marathons, watching them

hiking, with the right shoes

public schools

#metoo

neighbors

pie crust

yellow roses

vinegar spritzer

Walden Pond

Pete Buttigieg

giving away my homemade jams

kisses

ginger

running at my own pace

truth

Top Ten

Turkish delight

jasmine pearl tea

eyewear

outdoor fruit and vegetable markets

mushrooms

baking bread

being in my body

ukulele lessons 

pockets

giving books I love to people I think might love them too

Rereading The Girl of the Limberlost by Gene Stratton-Porter after more than 35 years, a book my grandmother gave to me

deserted diners

grandma Kelley's rice casserole

Le Mans Hall

midwives

Spencer Tunick

Budapesti Közkincs Könyvtár

clowns

David Byrne’s American Utopia

democracy

church bells

Gellért Fürdő

African chicken and peanut soup from the New England Soup Factory

martini with blue cheese stuffed olives

1059 Riverside

wonderland

gesztenyepüré

Greek yogurt with honey, in Greece

Book Club

Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins

Rome

Batman underwear for grownup women

Indigo Girls

dandelions

sleep

Warren Dunes State Park

The Overstory by Richard Powers

french fries

Ted Kooser

clean pressed sheets

walking by a lilac bush in bloom

holding hands

playgrounds

NPR

hard wood floors

handmade afghans

coffee

Jeune Homme Nu Assis au Bord de la Mer, by Jean- Hippolyte Flandrin

marching bands

HONK! festival of activist street bands

my clever, funny friend

roasted chestnuts

Duchess Goldblatt 

Asian Monday

Miss Mary, my terrible dog

birdie sing in the tree, woo woo woo, wee wee wee, I love you and you love me

Henszlmann Imre utca, 5

cuckoo clocks

handwritten letters

potluck dinners

Thai massage

Amanda Palmer

marathons, watching them

hiking, with the right shoes

public schools

#metoo

neighbors

pie crust

yellow roses

Walden Pond

Pete Buttigieg

giving away my homemade jams

kisses

ginger

running at my own pace

truth

Aspirational

 I Did Think, Let’s Go About This Slowly

by Mary Oliver

I did think, let’s go about this slowly.
This is important. This should take
some really deep thought. We should take
small thoughtful steps.

But, bless us, we didn’t.

Detachment

 

Telemachus’ Detachment 

Louise Gluck

When I was a child looking
at my parents' lives, you know
what I thought? I thought
heartbreaking. Now I think
heartbreaking, but also
insane. Also
very funny. 

Kissing

The Kiss

Stephen Dunn

She pressed her lips to mind.

—a typo

How many years I must have yearned
for someone’s lips against mind.
Pheromones, newly born, were floating
between us. There was hardly any air.

She kissed me again, reaching that place
that sends messages to toes and fingertips,
then all the way to something like home.
Some music was playing on its own.

Nothing like a woman who knows
to kiss the right thing at the right time,
then kisses the things she’s missed.
How had I ever settled for less?

I was thinking this is intelligence,
this is the wisest tongue
since the Oracle got into a Greek’s ear,
speaking sense. It’s the Good,

defining itself. I was out of my mind.
She was in. We married as soon as we could.

"The Kiss," from Everything Else in the World by Stephen Dunn. 

A Yellow Summer Dress

Why does this light force me back

   by Jane Kenyon

to my childhood? I wore a yellow
summer dress, and the skirt
made a perfect circle.
                         Turning and turning
until it flared to the limit
was irresistible . . . . The grass and trees,
my outstretched arms, and the skirt
whirled in the ochre light
of an early June evening.
                         And I knew then
that I would have to live,
and go on living: what sorrow it was;
and still what sorrow ignites
but does not consume
my heart.

Admittedly

Except for the Body

by Mary Oliver

Except for the body

of someone you love,

including all its expressions

in privacy and in public,

trees, I think,

are the most beautiful

forms on the earth.

Though, admittedly,

if this were a contest,

the trees would come in

an extremely distant second.