The day you stepped between me and a man
whose hands thought “No” meant “try harder,”
you set a barricade with your jaw
and I thought “Ah, this one likes to save me.”
The first time you tried to kiss me
your forehead bounced off the brim of my cap.
Every butterfly in my belly
flew into the sun rising on your cheeks.
When your tongue took a flying leap,
scrawled “I LOVE YOU” across the sky
I swallowed my reply
into ribs caging an entire ocean.
See, I’ve watched loved ones
drown in the storm of losing someone kind.
And God, you were so kind.
The kind of person who’d leave a mark,
the kind of person I’d write poems about.
Your love was never unrequited,
I just didn’t invite it past the front door.
But I watched you through the peephole
tucking daisies into my flower beds,
stacking pillows beneath my fire escape.
Fashion changes every season,
but the pattern of your comfort blanket
never went out of style.
Or the way you’d call me “My Angel”
like I lighthoused your shipwreck home.
I was never afraid of Facebook feeding me photos
until the street filled with splintered motorcycle
mangled white metal scraped across grey.
No
Google “motorcycle accident Hawaii”
No
Click on link “Hawaii News, 1 Hour Ago”
No
Scroll down, see your name
Read it twenty times, it does not change
No
I didn’t know how well I memorized your lines
until trying to untie the shoestring of your smile,
forget the constellation of your eyes,
how you told me my skeleton was sacred,
that my missing tooth made me holy.
I wish I had been hole-y,
let secrets spill through the palms of my hands.
I wish I crowbarred my collarbone open,
rolled stones from my tombs to let you in.
And I wish when you said you loved me
I said I love you back,
because now my chest is full of a hundred love letters
and my mouth is full of stamps,
but while they say Heaven is a place
no one seems to know its address.
So.
Come find me
as the sea drips from my lashes
rubbing salt in every wound.
As my ear begs spiral seashells
to hum the sound waves of your hello.
Come find me
as I telescope the horizon
for your yellow-kite sails.
As I sweep sand angels in your hourglass
wishing for wings to bring you home.
Come find me sinking in grief’s flood where
I learn to backstroke down my bloodstream
footrace your memory in my veins.
I learn to rescue my spirit from rock bottom,
drop my anchor where the weather is warm.
I learn I don’t have to die to stop living,
but also don’t have to live to keep giving
because your death keeps giving me new life.
Even when you’re gone
you save me.
The story of this poem:
More specifically, the story of the completion and presentation of it, not the subject of it. I will write about the subject another time.
At the very end of 2023 I entered my first slam poetry competition. Aileen was in Seattle for Christmas, the kids were with their father (the last Christmas they’d spend with him), and I was home alone for ten days.
Ten days.
Alone.
I love Aileen and the kids with all of my heart and soul AND I still dream of those ten days alone the way men can dream of their high school glory days or women can dream of the dark-haired scuba instructor in Cancun who showed them the motion of the ocean in more ways than one.
But this isn’t about the alone-ness, this post is about what it birthed.
I first encountered slam poetry in 2011, and as angsty poets ranted into the microphone I felt a flush of “Omg, I was born to do this.”
Then I tried to write poems, it was hard, and I gave up. Typical.
Fast forward 13 years to the alone-ness. I am sitting quietly in my quiet house quietly eating my gluten-free homemade pizza that is going to last me 6 days because I am the only one eating it, and in my Facebook feed I see a flyer for the next Honolulu Slam Poetry competition taking place in 7 days. And I think “I’m going to fucking do this.”
Apparently moms left completely alone are able to do new things.
I dug out unfinished drafts of poems started in 2011, read Andrea Gibson and Megan Falley’s tiny book “How Poetry Changes Your Heart,” and got to work. Five days, a mighty struggle with an online thesaurus, and a hundred trashed metaphors later I produce a finished piece I am proud of. I have a poem for the competition. I am ready.
I memorize the poem, practice it to all corners of my house until my throat hurts, get it to exactly 2 minutes and 55 seconds, then a vague recollection bubbles up. At the slams I attended a gajillion years ago, all of the poets did their poems, received scores, and then the top 3 did another poem.
Another poem.
Well that’s only for the top 3 to worry about.
But what if I am in the top 3 and have no another poem?
That “what if” sounds humbler than it was. I don’t enter competitions for fun, I enter to win. I find winning fun. Am I afraid of losing? No. Failure is good for us. But I plan to win. However, now my plan to win is foiled because the slam is tomorrow, the poem I have took 13 years and now I need to pull another poem out of thin air.
I spend the entire day of the slam trying to produce something resembling another poem. I print it out one minute before I need to leave.
Nervous? I don’t think anyone in that room was more nervous than me. I didn’t know anyone and did not invite anyone on purpose. I like to do things I’m uncomfortable with without witnesses I care about.
As planned, I make it into the top 3.
There is a phenom Punahou poet visiting for Christmas break who only gets tens. She deserves the tens, she is incredible. Full of vigor and drama and the rage of youth.
There is the reigning 3x Honolulu Slam Poetry champion. Need I say more?
And there is me. I take out my another poem printed on a piece of paper. When I get on stage I realize the lights shine through the page and make the words almost invisible. That explains why everyone read their poems off their phones.
My another poem did not win, but I did receive $30 for coming in third, which was a delightful surprise as I thought I was getting no dollars. I even bagged an invitation to the Grand Slam Championship five months later, also a surprise.
It’s been over two years since I’ve been to a poetry slam, but it feels like time to return. Good thing I am figuring out how to write poetry with people in the house.
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