The Faceting of Forever


Start
with carbon.
Bury it ninety miles beneath
the earth’s crust, in the mantle
under continental plates.

Apply
five gigapascals of pressure.
Bake at two thousand degrees
for a million years or more.

Wait
for volcanic action to push
the cargo upward.
Allow to cool, solidify. 

Mine.
Cut fifty-eight facets.
Count the carats.
Classify the clarity.

Marvel
that black matter 
in a black hole
can become colorless brilliance.
Admire the fire when the stone
disperses light into a spectrum.  

Fashion
onto a circle of platinum.
Feel the strength
to ward off suitors.
Place on the left ring finger
over the vein that runs to the heart.

A diamond can cut anything,
even cleave rock-hard faith
when the circle moves
from left hand to right 
severing forever.





Mr. Divorce Jimmied the Back Door 


Of course, he came to rob 
to take my peace of mind.
But why did he stay?
My frantic calls to 911 failed. 

I feel his eye 
at the keyhole as I bathe.
Did the curtains just move?
Why is the fridge door open,
milk nearly gone?

At night
he becomes a cloaked figure,
breath blowing cold. Like a dementor
Mr. D attempts to suck hope
right out of me. 

In daylight, he’s a nuisance
gloating over my shoulder
as I get up with the dogs at dawn
grill my own steak
plunge the toilet.
Rap rattles my cup and saucer
cigar ash smears mahogany, sooty
footprints mount the carpeted stairs.
And still, his shadow startles me
in every room.





If Left to Your Own Devices


What would you do?
I’d stay up late
watching Slings & Arrows
or Sex in the City
episode after episode 
or compose poems or
list things to do tomorrow
… never do them
because I’d sleep late,
take a nap,
stay on the computer too long.
I’d order in light gourmet 
and try to avoid junk food 
(I don’t consider chocolate 
junk, but please keep
the Cheetos away).
My Pilates coach would
come to the house
and make my stomach flat.
I’d see my roses but not the weeds,
watch currents skim the lake
but ignore the eroding shore;
I might even wade neck deep…
I’d convince myself
that it’s nice by myself,
and since the impossibly bad
had the audacity to happen, 
then it’s possible
the impossibly good
will show up soon.   





Visitor


A bare branch lounges
in my Adirondack chair
under the Japanese maple— 
gray, elegant:
Comforting to me,
now without a husband,
a good omen
in my walled garden
cocooned by snow.

-first published in Town Creek Poetry, Fall 2012 



Birthday Gift to Self
April 1, 2012

I’m still in my robe at 2 p.m.
though dishes removed from the sold sideboard
need to be bubble wrapped and snuggled
into U-Haul boxes my new man brought me.
Five miles of to do’s before I move 
to my downsized home. At least
dinner is set— 
he shops now, will cook tonight.
Midweek he told me
to wear a nice dress on Saturday. 
He’d put on his gray-blue suit.
The surprise? Tango
salsa, waltz until midnight
we lost our shoes to appease our burning feet, 
began in unison to hanker
for BLTs. He manned my stove. I toasted
rye bread, spread mayo, sliced a purple tomato.

Now Sunday, full of spring
birthday of nobody’s fool— 
Dogs wag at me for their ’round-the-block walk
but I allow my fingers to foxtrot
across the laptop keys,
printer hot with poetry.


-all poems from Untying the Knot (Aldrich Press, 2014), Karen Paul Holmes