All posts by rebekahjmarshall

Poetry, Writing

Hafiz – Poem 2

Leave a comment

I am reading Hafiz’s Little Book of Life, poetry by Hafiz-e Shirazi. He is challenging me to become more comfortable with ambiguity. I will share his poem and some of my thoughts on his poem (sometimes with the help of experts when the concepts are too hard for me), followed by a poem and some art inspired by his poem.

Hafiz’s Poem 2:

Everyone
Drives by
While I
Walk on alone

Some thoughts:

I can only relate metaphorically to this poem because walking is difficult for me. With my joint degeneration and chronic pain, driving is much more my speed. However, I respect the deeper meanings that might be of the walking-to-the-beat-of-your-own-drum sort of metaphor. If “I” am doing something that seems to be different from “Everyone,” but I believe it to be what is best for me, I must persist, despite the aloneness. Perhaps because of the aloneness.

Sometimes solitude is the best way to connect to purpose, find center, ground. The harried rush of this world can sap our energy and distract us from the quiet inner contemplation that can connect us to our better selves. We cannot be of service to others if we are barreling through life so fast we have lost our own ability to reflect, to ponder, to get to know the quiet of our own minds. It is only here that most of us can hear the still, small voice.

I’m not sure what kind of drivers were racing past Hafiz on his alone walk in the 1300s, but I assume they were carts pulled by horses and people on horseback mostly. Faster than the pace of a walker, but nothing compared to the 80mph drivers on Texas highways. My, the poems he would have written about the rush of life we live today.

My Poem 2:

My H.E.B. has electric shopping carts
for people like me to use in their store.
They are slow, so as not to endanger
other shoppers who could be run over.

They beep loudly and embarrassingly
if I need to back up for overshooting.
They are awkward for direction changes,
and can be the cause of traffic jams.

But I no longer feel anything other than
thankfulness when I drive them to shop.
The lack of pain while choosing for myself
provides autonomy and independence.

I may drag the cord behind me like a tail,
stall and get stranded by a depleted battery,
and back into the occasional display or wall,
but I move at a pace that is mine alone.

Hafiz. Hafiz’s Little Book of Life. Translated by Erfan Mojib and Gary Gach, Hampton Roads Publishing, 2023.

Poetry, Writing

Hafiz – Poem 1

Leave a comment

I am reading Hafiz’s Little Book of Life, poetry by Hafiz-e Shirazi. He is challenging me to become more comfortable with ambiguity. I will share his poem and some of my thoughts on his poem (sometimes with the help of experts when the concepts are too hard for me), followed by a poem and some art inspired by his poem.

Hafiz’s Poem 1:

Between these two doors
                                 This caravan

Some thoughts:

The imagery of doors implies entrances and exits, passageways, or boundaries. Two doors suggest pillars of demarcation in time, place, awareness or perhaps binary contrasts. Opposite ends of conceptual delineations like birth and death or past and future seem like reasonable possibilities.

But those don’t seem to be what Hafiz is concerned with. He is pointing out the between. What is happening in the interim, the dash? Of course, the interesting part is the journey. We get so hyper-focused on reaching the destination that we become uncomfortable with the time spent in the now learning to be patient.

I picture a caravan of camels carrying the worldly goods of travelers long distances, the people eager for trade, companionship, good food, fresh water, music, romance, and laughter. It is life in motion. The doors are really of no consequence right now. They are the least of our concern when we have all this living to do.

My Poem 1:

Unmoored, afloat, uncertain if hope
is a delusion or a virtue
stillness sits where ambition
once cracked her knuckles

the in-between is where?
beginning was once easy to define
though ending is unknown
the certainty of it was assumed

now nothing reveals itself as absolute
except this protest march
that might possibly transform
into a celebratory parade

Hafiz. Hafiz’s Little Book of Life. Translated by Erfan Mojib and Gary Gach, Hampton Roads Publishing, 2023.

All images created by Rebekah Marshall’s prompts using AI on Gencraft.com website.

Poetry, Writing

Childhood

Leave a comment

TRIGGER WARNING: This poem contains references to childhood trauma, gun violence, animal death and desecration, and disturbing imagery involving cruelty to animals. It reflects lived experience and may be distressing for some readers. Please read with care.

Image created by Rebekah Marshall’s prompt using AI on Gencraft.

Apparently, it is not most people’s
experience to be shot at on a
summer morning before the heat
forces children indoors to rest.

I guess we thought it was a mostly
fair fight, since we were lobbing
rocks and they couldn’t hit moving
targets if their lives depended on it.

Two neighbor boys teamed up with
their boredom and a whole summer
of scheming to counter our riotous
fun they were not invited to join.

But they took it too far when they
unburied Daisy Bo Kay, our freshly
dead basset hound, and strung her up
in a tree hoping we’d find her corpse.

She didn’t do anything to deserve
such treatment, just sit and sigh,
howl when we got too rambunctious,
witness the strangeness of our survival.

Poetry, Writing

My Son Trey

2 Comments
Image created by Rebekah Marshall’s prompt using AI on Gencraft.

My son Trey, short for Trajectory, lives in a parallel universe. With my whiteness stirred in, he is a lighter-skinned miniature version of his father, right down to the little glasses that he’s needed since he started reading at the age of two. He stands in the driveway waiting for the school bus, swishing his skirts back and forth, and my heart aches because I know the teasing he will endure. He is a queen for the Living History Museum whose merits he and his father talked excitedly about while I made the costume, torn between pride that my son’s favorite person is a woman and the compulsion to pressure him to pick a man. This morning as I sip my tea in my present universe, tears spring unbidden at this memory. Here, my history-loving husband and I chose not to have Trey or any other children. Oh, how I miss my sweet boy.

Poetry, Writing

Killer Love Song

Leave a comment

TRIGGER WARNING: This poem contains graphic metaphoric language and imagery related to physical harm, violence, and bodily injury, presented in a stylized and symbolic manner. While not literal, the content may be disturbing for some readers, particularly those sensitive to themes of abuse or violence in relationships. Reader discretion is advised.

Image created by Rebekah Marshall’s prompt using AI on Gencraft.

Start with the pinky, snap the tip
Then work your way up the hand to the wrist
To break the arm, you’ll need a tight grip.

When love takes hold and makes the heart skip
You might hesitate, but I must insist
Start with the pinky, snap the tip

The signal an upward curve of the lip
Ignore all attempts if one tries to resist
To break the arm, you’ll need a tight grip.

Dresses are easy, they merely unzip
Buttons are harder; they require a twist
Start with the pinky, snap the tip

If all else fails, just give it a rip
No need to worry, no one will be missed                                 
To break the arm, you’ll need a tight grip.

The best way to tackle a relationship
is to find the one who’s never been kissed
Start with the pinky, snap the tip
To break the arm, you’ll need a tight grip.

Poetry, Writing

You Ever Wonder?

Leave a comment
Image created by Rebekah Marshall’s prompt using AI on Gencraft.

You ever wonder how we keep from flying off this giant muffin when it’s going over 60,000 miles an hour? Like, a spaceship made of dirt and water, it’s outer skin nothing more than a layer of air holding all us guts in while screaming through space at 60,000 miles an hour. And any second another chunk of rock could slam into our bowling ball hot air balloon and we could shoot off like fireworks spraying out of a soda bottle at 60,000 miles an hour. Unless we’re more like a frisbee ‘cause we’re flat earthers and this giant paper plate planet is flinging and boomeranging around the sun at 60,000 miles an hour. Maybe the whole way to survive in this solar system is to keep moving as fast as you can, ‘cause if we stop, we die, and nobody wants to die, well, some people want to die, but not like that in a crash going 60,000 miles an hour. And think about it, these doctors are trying to slow us down with all these meds, making us walk around like zombies eating our own brains, drooling in our sleep, and slurring our speech ‘cause that’s supposedly better somehow, even though they should be smart enough to know that we have to keep the wheel spinning and spinning and spinning and spinning at least 60,000 miles an hour, or we’ll screech to a halt and scream forever like that Munch painting where the squiggledy guy is slapping both hands on his face like the Home Alone kid all because Krakatoa blew and burned and bled.

Poetry, Writing

Surgeon

Leave a comment
Image created by Rebekah Marshall’s prompt using AI on Gencraft.

Shall we dance?
Ok, people
let’s get this show
on the road.
Saddle up
This cowboy’s
ready to ride.

Doc, she’s a high five.

I know, I know.
I’m double gloved.
I ain’t afraid o’ no ghosts.
But I do wish
she was a virgin.

She’s a road map, Doc.

Yep. I’m ready.
Why are we
still gabbing?
Let’s Whipple this
in time for lunch.

Doc, she’s already painted.

Cameraman?
Check.
She good and out Gas Man?
Check.
10-blade.
Have I told y’all
about the 11-hole GSW?

We’ve heard that one, Doc.

Hmmm….well, how about
back when I worked ER,
and Sister Mildred was
a frequent flier,
always came late at night.

Doc, we’ve heard them all.

Telling my tales
relaxes me,
keeps me focused.
Humor me, people.
What about Biker Bill?

That’s a good one, Doc.

Well, Biker Bill
was circling the drain,
refusing to discharge up.
His organs were trash.
We needed his bed.

Doc, she’s trying to help.

Dammit, Gas Man,
do your job.
Why do you get
the big bucks
if not to make
my job easier?
Are you kidding me?

Ok, she’s out Doc.

Buzz me, Nurse.
So Biker Bill
just won’t do
the celestial discharge
and in walks
his wife.
I’ll need the retractors next.

Doc, why was he in the ER?

Metal poisoning. Followed
by MVA. So, anyway,
in walks his wife.
All she wants to know
is if he cheated on her
before getting
himself shot.

Did he, Doc?

Well, that’s where
the story gets good.
Test him for VD,
she screams.
The guy’s doing
the death rattle,
but she wants proof.

Doc, you ready for staples?

Almost, but then
in walks the girlfriend.
After security broke up
the fight, I had to lay crepe
with them handcuffed
to either side of
his bed.

I thought you broke up the fight, Doc.

Maybe I did,
I don’t remember.
I just know it took
that man way too long
to check out and we
had to sit and listen to
their love triangle all night.

Doc, we done?

Yep. This one’s
a winner. I think
we got it all.
Good work, team.
I told y’all we
could finish in
time for lunch.