Thanksgiving

My first Thanksgiving without Joe.

Your first Thanksgiving you tasted mashed potatoes and gravy for the first time, then couldn't get enough...We were worried you would get sick because you were not supposed to be eating solid food yet, but you were fine.

Joe, I am thankful you were such a big part of my life for 20 years. I miss you and love you.

-Dad

Kramer stops for a moment

Kramer-named for the character on Seinfeld because she never makes a quiet entrance...

Favorite Picture of Joe: Happy, kind and loving...

Blood, Sweat and Tears

Cool morning

Push mower

Shearing grass tops

Rhythmic motion

Mindless meditative work

Temperature rising

Air and body warming

Salty sweat

Beginning to flow

Clipper trimming

Stray branches

Inch-long thorns

Scratch and puncture

Unprotected arms

Blood mixing with sweat

Rake lifting 

Leaves and twigs 

From green carpet

Scent of mown grass

Fatigue setting in

Rest In cool shade

Remembering

A young boy

And his dad

Planting  a garden

Work and play intertwined

Big boy

And little man

Sweating and dirty

Tired and happy

Mourning

Loss of a son 

Pondering

What it is like

To be

Eternally

Nineteen

Memories

Scratch and puncture

Unprotected heart

Tears blending

With other fluids

(c)2011BT

What If?

What if I die

And I haven’t cooked dinner for you?

Haven’t held your hand?

Haven’t argued with you?

Comforted you?

Kissed you?

What if I die

And I haven’t told you that you're beautiful?

Haven’t pushed you

Teased you

Challenged you

Nurtured

Or encouraged you?

What if I die

And I haven’t shared a sunset with you

Walked in the moonlight with you

Watched a movie with you

Given you gifts

Been mad at you

Cried with you

What if I die

And I haven’t said I love you?

Will you ever know?


(C)BT 2009

Twisted

Hope this doesn't offend anyone,

Just have to get it off my chest.

I’ve smelled burned flesh,

Blood, shit, piss, puke,

Bacterial infections, and toxic chemicals.

I’ve sorted body parts

After a terrorist bombing

Knowing that one of the bodies

Could be someone I love.

I’ve remained professional and nonjudgmental

While working with a man

Who sodomized his six-month old daughter.

I’ve sat with a woman and convinced her

That the unrecognizable person in the burn unit

Is her 18-year-old son,

Who will not survive.

I’ve watched a man have a stroke

Because of the medication I gave him

To dissolve the blood clot in his coronary artery.

I’ve administered 360 joules of electrical energy

To a woman’s chest,

Over and over again,

Knowing there is no chance for survival.

I’ve stayed with a patient

Until he died after we stopped the ventilator,

Then cried with the family

And prepared the body for the morgue.

I’ve heard the cries of a 20-year-old girl

Who miscarried

In the seventh month.

I’ve started an IV on a convicted murderer.

I’ve stood watch in the trauma center

When the president was in town,

Hoping some wacko

Wouldn’t choose tonight to assassinate.

I’ve felt ribs break while doing CPR.

I’ve done mouth to mouth

On a man in cardiac arrest

Whose arm was amputated at the shoulder

From a motor vehicle collision.

I’ve felt skin come off the wrist

Of the body I was removing from a house fire.

I’ve cracked jokes

While removing the tattoo of a swastika

From a white supremacist’s burned shoulder.

I’ve started an IV

In a drug addict’s penis

Because it was the only vein he hadn’t used.

I’ve had a patient’s finger

Come off in my hand

During a burn dressing.

I’ve taken care of a mob style-shooting victim

Before PD arrived,

Knowing that the shooter

Could still be out there

And I might have a target on my back.

I’ve laughed, joked, shouted and cried

While listening to the equally horrific stories

Of firemen, policemen, nurses, doctors and soldiers

Over pizza and beer.

...No wonder I'm twisted


(C)BT 2010

Serendipitous Synchronistic Communication

Two strangers

Pulled together

By the unseen

Gazing at each other

Expressing amazement

Wonder

And appreciation

For the

Magic of their meeting

Smiles, laughter,

Kisses, caresses

Feeling the joy of their merging

Talking

Late into the night

Sharing

Stories and lessons

Dreams and desires

Creating

A mutual vision

A collage of their potential

And

Then

Facing

Forward

They walk

Hand-in-hand

Into their future.

©2011 BT

A favorite quote

What makes the desert beautiful

is that somewhere

it hides a well.

 --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Writing

Writing is easy:  

All you do is sit staring at a blank sheet of paper 

until drops of blood form on your forehead.

  --Gene Fowler


RSVP

I’m having dinner at five

You could meet me

It would be nice to see you

Warm feeling in my chest

Footsteps lighter

Easy laughter

Amazing change

In outlook

Knowing

At day’s end

Will be

Your smile

Your bright eyes

Good conversation

Mundane, tedious day

Now transformed

To eager anticipation

©2010 BT

Sky

Whitewater Draw, Southern Arizona

Brain Laxative

Writers block

Frustrates

Sometimes

Days, weeks or months

Without a word

Then

A conversation

A call from an old friend

A new romance

Or a sunset

Triggers

The free flow of words

From the collective unconscious

Causing

The needed release

Of

Mental diarrhea

©2011 BT

Fire Opals

 Tiny jewels and scars

Ornament her body

Glimmers and bumps

Each triggering memories

Of past pains

And pleasures

And dreams

Of volcanoes

And molten lava

Fire opals shimmering

Like the glimmer in her eyes.

©2009 BT

Sphincter

There is not a muscle or structure in the body

that has a more keenly developed sense of alertness

and ability to accommodate itself to varying situations.

It is like the goalie in hockey...always alert.

They say man has succeeded

where the animals fail

because of the clever use of his hands yet,

when compared to the hands,

the sphincter ani is far superior.

If you place into your cupped hands

a mixture of fluid, solid, and gas

and then, through an opening at the bottom,

try to let only the gas escape,

you will fail.

Yet the sphincter ani can do it.

The sphincter apparently

can differentiate between solid, fluid, and gas.

It apparently

can tell whether its owner is alone or with someone,

whether standing up or sitting down,

whether its owner has his pants on or off.

No other muscle in the body

is such a protector of the dignity of man,

yet so ready to come to his relief.

A muscle like this is worth protecting.

Excerpt from the introduction of a report on hemorrhoidectomy written by WC Bornemeier and published in Am J of Proc, Feb, 1960.)

(ONLINE CREATION)

Another computer generated poem--obviously less-sophisticated program...

Once More, My Love

This night I shall dream

 of your bedazzling green hair and panther-eyes.

Wrapped in echoes

of your mellifluous arm-music,

I long to sip from your mangoful lips.

In my dreams,we fly

on the exquisite winged eggplant of redness

skimming vast continents

of elbows and horses.

The depths of all the oceans

of the universe

shall never separate our apples.

Brilliant as singing escalators,

the seas greet us from afar.

In the twilight we feast

on chocolate-coated hedgehogs

and tender stealth bomber hearts of love

Adorned in white silk, we pluck

our thundering love chimes

from our knees.

I press the lightning

that you wear around your neck

against my elbow-muffin

so that our mangos melt into one.

You will always be

my little Magdalena

cakes face,

the panther

of my own singing eye of love.

Computer Generated Poem

I Am

I am curious and afraid

I wonder what life has in store for me

I hear the sound of church bells

I see dragons in flight

I want to love and be loved

I am curious and afraid

I pretend to know a lot

I feel elated

I touch your soul

I worry you will reject me

I cry to think I will never see you again

I am curious and afraid

I understand the universe provides

I say accept me for who I am

I dream of flying wingless

I try to express my feelings

I hope You will accept

I am curious and afraid

This was generated a few years ago by a computer program--I simply entered the words it requested (a noun, a verb, an adjective...) and the program created the poem. Isn't technology amazing? 

Onomatopoeia (with apologies to Shel Silverstein)

I’ve always wanted

To use

The word

Onomatopoeia

In a meaningful sentence.

Oh, guess I just did!

Never mind.

(c) 2011 BT

Terrorism

Bad dreams

Nightmares

A teenage boy

Refrigerators

Full of blood

Fear

(Don’t let them see)

Responsibility

Car bomb

Six or more patients coming

Type and cross

Twenty units

Ambulance arrives

No lights

No siren

Hands, feet, torsos, heads

Delivered in makeshift stretchers

Made from olive drab blankets

No survivors

The job has shifted

From saving lives

To body identification

Knowing one could be Dad

Putting the puzzle together

So that family and friends

Can say goodbye.

©2010 BT

Darkness

Trapped in a tunnel

Light at the end

Gets smaller

And dimmer

Options narrowing

Faint musky odor

Air neither cold

Nor warm

Stagnant

Invisible things move

Slithering, slinking

Shadow beings

Never quite visible

Standing still

Heart pounding

Audible

Above the dull silence

Senses dulled

Disoriented

No pain

No fear

No joy

No anger

No peace

Nothing

Wishing for sleep

Hoping to waken

When the light returns

Fearful it will disappear

During slumber

Never to return

Or be replaced

By something unknown

(C) 2010 BT