So, well. I’m behind again. Never boast that you’re all caught up because then it only takes a single nod from a god to put you behind again. Or, you know, your own procrastination and life and work and all the other things that keep you from writing.

NaPoWriMo Day 5 (on day 10 but who’s counting? 😉 )

All the Words I Needed

She died.
We knew it was coming. She told us.
She touched up her red hair, laughed, drank Woodford Reserve, and continued to write poetry that etched in our souls.
But cancer is mean and stealthy and finally it stole her away when we were looking elsewhere.
When we turned back, she was gone, like smoke, like a breeze, like a poet writing on parchment.
I’ve thought of her for days, though I didn’t know her. Well. At all.
And those that did, march on, always on, as if her torch passed easily on. 
And did it? 
I feel lost in this cavern.
I feel lost in this life.
These days.
Pandemic days.
Wondering where to go, who to be.
The ugly dance a pilgrim’s dance of mythological hatred. 
All arms and unruly legs.
They rise and fall on misogynists’ knees.
Immortality dissolves. Dry ice rising in fog.
But she wrote to the end.
Patted her dog on the head. 
“I didn’t write all the words, but I always wrote the words I needed.”