Emphasis of NO

 "I often question my sanity. Occasionally, it replies."
- Darynda Jones.

In the weedy, overgrown
garden of my mind lucid
stomps its foot like an impatient child,
and demands I pluck dandelions
from the edge of my teeth
to at least form a sentence 
of more than one syllable.

I feel saying no doesn’t demand
adjectives, excuses, or explanation.
There isn’t an obscure essay buried
in my throat filled with paragraphs
of reasoning…just two letters, 
a verbal stop sign, NO.

The blackbird in me, dare I say Raven,
prefers the watcher’s perch to the
chattery bluster of raking my thoughts
to reassure sanity I haven’t slipped 
into my dotage.

So, what if I appear to be a faded yellow magnolia.
Consider the flower’s pod that appears to be
a mere dried cone, but inside is bright blooded
with red berries…I’m not everything I think
nor everything one sees.

Rather than hold court in my own head
arguing there is more than enough evidence
I have not lost my mind, I just address the
pestering interrogation with my sworn
testimony of truth, “No.” 

Susie Clevenger 2023

Word Garden Word List ~ William Wordsworth

Not Every Moon Carries Salvation

 

Widows of the moon dance

their disjointed steps across

the eye of night hoping 

to lure mortal flesh to test

the maze of eternity.

In lace cuffs stitched with ice

and gray wind they turn cartwheels

across window ledges leaving notes

only nightmares can decipher.

Dreamers seasick with visions

roam their own imaginations

trying to escape what daylight

planted in their irises, and words

that are keys that never open doors.

Pale sisters of bladed slivers of light,

they wander the impatient breath

of 3:00 a.m. muting tongues that

pray for deliverance. 

©Susie Clevenger 2023

Word Garden Word List--Keith Reid