Sample Poems by Linda Cronin
A Practical Life
I don’t live a very practical life.
Working a nine to five job with a weekly paycheck,
married in a house in the suburbs,
with a mini-van sleeping in the driveway
waiting for the buzz of morning carpool.
Instead, I have spent my days
in and out of hospitals and wheelchairs,
waiting, waiting, waiting,
for some doctor who will come along and fix me,
like a car waiting for the mechanic
who tinkers under the hood
tightens a thingamabob here,
changes a whatamacallit there,
and rotates the tires
before sending her off good as new
to travel a few thousand miles more
before being traded in for a fancier, flashier model.
I prepared for that practical life like a good Girl Scout.
Earning useful badges in accounting,
filling my sash with experience,
expanding my network of contacts,
all to land the perfect job,
where I’d earn my paycheck,
discover fulfillment behind a desk,
and find Mr. Right who would marry me
secure my financial future and
give me the kids and the house.
Instead, I should have
wandered in the night,
counting the stars glittering in the sky,
bought flowers that smelled like possibility
even in the dead of winter and
hid, tucked away in antique bookstores
where words were cradled and loved.
I know now I’ll never live that practical life
more certain than ever.
And so, I enter the life of dreams
weaving words into the world I dream could be.
Dream Bones
In my dreams, I still see my bones
as they once were — long and lean,
stronger than the steel that now supports them.
They formed my body, graceful and slender,
racing across the blacktop like a gazelle.
They shine like white marble
with a hint of icy blue,
the blue that appears
when some thing is too white,
so pure, it makes your teeth ache.
Now, my bones sway in the darkness
like willow branches in the wind,
curving and twisting
without the strength to stand tall.
My limbs like rivers wander
this way and that,
without direction or purpose.
My bones crumble
under the daily stress and strain,
pressure chipping away at the surface
leaving a trail of crumbs behind.
Braces appear overnight,
like ivy clinging to the fence, thriving in spring.
And, like a scaffold on a decaying building,
they shore up bones too weak
to stand alone or support the body
dependent on them.
What the doctor compares x-rays and scans,
my bones seen to have vanished,
melting like vapor until only
a shadow remains.
Some Days
Some days come without instructions,
missing diagrams and unlabeled parts.
Those days when Piece D no longer slides into Slot E,
and Piece F goes AWOL altogether.
When pain rolls in like banks of fog,
and the days blur together,
the reception fuzzy. I try
to answer the apparent questions
infiltrating my days.
Years earlier, when you folded me into your arms,
the last of your four children, hours old,
snow encasing us in a world
turned pure and silent,
you never imagined days like this,
the blessing of not knowing the future.
The nights you dream of days spent
at the beach, building castles,
days without illness or pain
lead you forward, tantalize you
into rising up and brushing off the dust.
Now, years from that day, Mom, you stand by
my side at those times without instructions,
having abandoned the pieces and slots.
Tugging my hand as the waves surge
and drive across the sand,
a steady force climbing into the night
you urge me to wait, to continue,
to focus on the seasons to come,
to stand strong and proud
when the waves wash over me
and the sand disappears
from beneath my feet.
Diagnosis
Waiting in the exam room,
I imagine the x-rays,
clean and stark,
harsh black and white images
edges clearly delineated.
Here — good. There — bad.
Negative and positive
outlined purely.
Defined by light. By rays.
So when the doctor hangs
the x-rays before me,
I’m not prepared.
Before me a world of
shadows. Clouds of gray.
Edges smudged.
As if a child’s eraser smeared
the images. Sweat blurring
the lines. The doctor explains.
Shows the outline that creeps
beyond the border
until it slips away.
Black and white,
negative and positive,
into uncertainty bleed.
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