I’m so glad I got a great haircut
When we were still able to go outside

Maybe I can copy it with the scissors
I also use to wrap presents and cut the string
Off chicken legs

How hard can it be to trim my dog’s nails
Our forefathers did it right? I’m sure
It’s baked into my DNA

I wonder how long it takes to grow grapes
That’s all we need at the store but
I don’t think it’s worth the risk 

~  Robin J. Phillips March 17, 2020

Is it possible to stop being scared about what might happen
And just know that your own heaven is something
Here on earth that you have made with your own
Hands
Your own
Heart

Whatever happens
Here I am
On the grassy path around the lake
Where the sun shines brightly
And the old man stands erect
fishing

~ Robin J. Phillips March 13, 2020

We can hear much better than we can see
We can hear around corners
We can hear behind us
We can hear with our eyes closed

We can hear faint whispers and loud cries
Over the sounds of the city, we hear birds in the trees

I love music and the ocean and the sounds
people make when they are having fun
But sound has become my own personal scoundrel 

In a quiet room these days
I often hear the sound of cicadas returning
In the dead of winter, those pesky summer bugs
deafen me with their courtship calls 

Around corners,
behind me,
when my eyes are closed
the constant buzzing of cicada
fills my head, invades my evenings
What a strange trick of nature that the
early road to hearing loss is a head full of noise

Sure, there’s no true silence
Even in a chamber isolated from outside sound
doctors say people hear their hearts beat
the sound of blood rushing through their veins
the high whine of their fears

I do not plan to go gently into my silent night
So far to battle the cicada song, this harbinger of hearing loss
I continue to play music and dream of the ocean
And fill my house with people having fun

~ Robin J. Phillips March 6, 2020

If I had a sister
She’d be sassy and fun
Really smart and kind of naughty
With a twinkle in her eye 

If I had a sister
We’d talk on the phone
All the time well nearly every day
Just to hear each other’s hearts

If I had a sister
She’d teach me to love
In the way that women in my family
Hold on to each other forever

~ Robin J. Phillips March 5, 2020

What do I taste in a ripe mango?
I taste sweet fruit
under tough skin
I taste a perfect match for apple
in a fresh baked pie
I taste a healthy shake made with
banana and almond milk
But most of all
I taste the rainbows that appear high above Mānoa

~ Robin J. Phillips March 4, 2020