marbles

marbles

---

on
my
birthday

every single year,
I turn three---again! years come,
they go; it does not

matter the number
rushing by---I'm but only,
still yet only, three
                                     ---barbsdad
---

I
think

it might surprise
you to know that I
remember when

as a little kid
my very favorite
place my father

ever worked was
at an ice-cream
factory ...

---

I
can

only imagine
what it's like for
the fish of this world ---

daddy fish saying,
as he leaves his
beautiful ocean-
coral home for work,

"OK, Mama. Be
home by five. I can
pick up the kids
after their football
practice, you know, on
the way. Be happy
to, and no problem,"

and
then

climbing into his
plug-in yellow sub, a fin
at the controls, another
already text-
messaging away,

then

bobbing his head out
the driver's door:

"Hey, Mama, the keys
aren't here; I think I
left them on the kitchen
table. Be a dear,
bring them out to me."

                  --- and so it goes

---

just
the
two
of
us

spread-eagled I lay
myself against the full of
silvered moon for to

let

its pale light cool me
of summer's beginning heat;
not satisfied at

once, I lay myself
at rock bottom of ocean's
deepest, darkest trench,

when,

narrowly missed by
falling anchor---and so dark
it is!---I leave in

search of flowing stream
to lie facing up from its
mucky bed, when right

along Mr. Snapping
Turtle arrives to
claim his space; I run---

with skin
unblemished,

my bones intact---to
find my so very good friend
Ms. Squirrel; and now

the two of us sprawl
beside one another, our
tails aflare, our bare

tummies pressed firm hard
against grasses' greenest green
as we mark slow the

creeping brown of our
world as sun ripes the season
in the direction sure

of hot

---