Tag Archives: puzzled

Puzzled

Puzzled

Life is an exquisite puzzle whose pieces do not fit
each and every time that we seek to conquer it.
Its pieces are not shaped ahead. We form them as we go.
No solutions irrefutable. We grow them as we grow.
Caprice may may make life difficult—impossible to match
the present situation to pieces in the batch
cut out when life was scheduled, predictable and set
to lead in a direction where we will never get.
Life is wild and errant. It goes not where we lead.
We think that it’s the flower, but sometimes it’s just seed
that’s sewn in rocky soil that does not heed its growth.
Good fortune and adversity? We need to fit them both
into the picture of our lives. Each has its unique power
to turn what looks impossible into a thriving flower.

My guiding words today were caprice, irrefutable, errant, exquisite and puzzle.

Wallpaper

DSC09880

 

Wallpaper

Clinging to the wall
like an old wallpaper scrap
are the words
I want you, I want you, I want you, I want you.

Their refrain slides up and down
the musical scale—
an old country tune,
plaintive and clear.

Why do I want you?

The first time I met you,
there was something about the curl of your hair.
Your eyes, so familiar­—puzzled, as though
you, too, were trying to remember.

After that, it was
the set of your shoulders—
the arm stretched between your seat and mine
with your hand on the back of my seat.

All of your restraint an aphrodesiac.

The truth is
that I pined
for two days after I left,
then went on with my life.

Still, that scrap
of wanting
comes up early in the morning
as I waken

and my mind walks,
looking for someone to pin it to,
and every time
it stops at you.

The prompt today is puzzled.