Parental Superpowers: Magic Lips
If my child has a boo boo
From random sibling violence
I draw that child close
And use these Healing Lips of Silence.
If someone thuds or falls or slips,
Or hits their head upon the table,
The problem’s solved with magic lips
Pre-pursed, ready and able
To stop the crying by release of
A parental magic potion.
A blend of spit and parent love
In super hero motion.
We Don’t Grill Babies
After stuffed animals and baby dolls were shown,
As exhibitions of my son’s playing.
It’s likely my voice contained a confused tone
At the wonder of what I was saying.
My son was grilling dinner on the ottoman, it
Took me a moment but I thought a minute
And after rationalizing “yeses”, “Nos” and “Maybes”,
I came up with, “we don’t grill babies.
You can grill animals ‘till your heart’s content
But a baby who does not consent
Cannot be cast on the flames of a grill.
To be disposed of at your will.
In fact, a baby who does consent cannot be killed
Simply because the two of you willed
It to be so. Human life contains value.
So grill a tasty animal pal you’d
Like to eat instead
Of pretending the babies are dead.”
My wife gave me a smirkey smile from the other chair,
Loving me and the words I chose to share
With our three year-old who was grilling
Babies that no one should be killing.
Mid-Calf Tube
I will only wear the mid-calf tube from this day on.
I will throw out every other sock I own
And I’ll forget them when their gone,
Pretend the mid-calf’s all I’ve known.
The marvelous mid-calf tube, sweet foot pocket,
Blissful blazes of bleached glory
Busting eyes out of the sockets
That look on to this bright story.
The story when we retire all our other socks.
Is this that day, or is this just the buzz we
Chatter about when we talk
So we can dream of that white fuzzy.
That future memory that’s not so distant
If we’re consistently persistent
In our standards for our socks.
When we go out on our walks,
Or go to the grocery store
We shouldn’t have any more
Mismatched temptations
Yielding pairations
Of socks never meant to go together.
Time constraints should not force a pair.
I dream of a day where
It doesn’t matter whether
I have my eyes open or closed
When I go in the sock drawer.
What are we pre-pairing for,
When we could have proposed
The solution long ago.
It’s time to rise up and take action
Join this mid-tube faction
And Throw out every other sock we know.
*I usually don’t preface poems with thoughts… but wanted to throw a couple things out there. 1). My wife is not currently pregnant. This poem would prompt the question from some of my readers. 2). where this is coming from: I was remembering the weirdness of this thought when Matthias (our youngest) was still in the womb. My wife and I have had 3 kids thus far and with each one of them, it strikes me that the government gives us these “free passes” to kill our children up to a certain age. Weirder still, if my wife and I weren’t on the same page, then she could kill my child without my permission.
Legally Killing My Son.
The government gives someone else permission to kill my child.
Isn’t that wild?
That my wife
Could go without my knowledge and take a life.
And not just any life, but that of my son.
My flesh and blood undone.
Unraveled, unwound.
Never found outside the womb by this father.
Never seen to be more than a memory
By me without a choice,
Left without a voice.
Rubberized Grip Pen
Don’t you hate when you’re writing and then
Your pen slips out of your hands?
What you need is a rubberized grip on your pen
So each finger understands
That they shouldn’t give in to the slippery friction
That often occurs when you’re writing
Your pen should step up to an elegant diction
And stop this ridiculous fighting
With fingers that keep on impressing their prints
As the whites of each digit turn whiter.
Your fingers are frustrated writing in stints.
You uncramp, then hold your pen tighter.
But stop the madness, there’s no longer a need,
There are new pens on the market to feed
Your hunger for a pen that doesn’t slip.
Go buy yourself one with a rubberized grip.
BonjourPoetry 