My Middle Name Is Joan

I loved my Aunt Joan’s house
after school. That’s where we 
checked in before heading home
a block away to listen to music and
work on homework ‘til Mom came home.

Some lucky days I hung out with
Joan, a child of Wyoming, 
wife of a Nebraska farmer now 
tending a backyard garden in the suburbs.

I balanced on a kitchen stool, thumbing 
through True Crime and watching
Joan play solitaire and smoke 
her way through a box of Kents.

She played at rapid speed
slapping down 52 cards in sequence
leading to four neat piles, 
hearts, spades, clubs, diamonds.

I never thought she was paying much 
attention to me until she tapped the table,
ground down her cigarette and announced,
‘Let’s go to the back porch and shuck some peas.’

~ Robin J. Phillips Feb. 23, 2020

Big Bag of Pills

I don’t have my mother’s eyes
I don’t have my mother’s nose
I do have a diamond ring and a Dali print
Mom bought on a cruise one time
that my brother thinks is worthless.

And I have a big bag of pills sitting in
the corner of a closet that I can’t
bring myself to look at or flush or take
to CVS for safe disposal. 

Mom’s medicine was meant to keep her
heart alive and keep her spirit strong
and keep her here with me.

She’s no longer here with me.
The pills stay in the closet.

~ Robin J. Phillips Feb. 18, 2020

The Moths Are Back

 

 

I didn’t know the moths were back
until I saw one crushed by the cupboard door
above the laundry. 

It must have come inside early
fleeing from the late snow
taking refuge in the warm, damp
room where we clean clothes and
store cans of peas, supplies for the winter.

~ Robin J. Phillips Feb. 13, 2020

Headwaters

After three days of rain
the river now owns
the fields
next to Greenville Highway.

It’s called the French Broad
on summer days when I float
down ten miles, under three bridges
to where the van picks us up.

Broad is too small a word today.
The river has spread like a
lake, a pool, an ocean
as it crosses the fields

Threatens the highways
takes over parking lots
cutting its way through the
Southern Appalachians

Running south to north, like the Nile,
racing waters have slowed
and spread
and soaked
everything in her way.

Even from the safety of my car
it’s frightening to see
the vast wetness that’s flushing
farms and fields
next to Greenville Highway.

~ Robin J. Phillips Feb. 7, 2020