May 15: Chuck E. Cheese's, Ellen Bryant Voigt, Another Sonnet

It is almost midnight, and I'm waiting for my phone to ring.  My daughter is on her way back from Great America with her class.  When she gets to Chuck E. Cheese's in Green Bay, someone is supposed to call me to let me know.

It's been a long day.  I was up at 3:45 this morning to drive my daughter to school.  I went to work.  Went to a concert by a chorale group.  Now, I'm watching Jimmy Fallon and staring at my phone, willing it to ring.  I have a feeling that bus is going to be pulling into the school parking lot around 3 a.m.

Saint Marty needs a little poetry to stay awake.

from Ellen Bryant Voigt's Kyrie

I always thought she ought to have an angel.
There's one I saw a picture of, smooth white,
the wings like bolts of silk, breasts like a girl's--
like hers--eyebrows. all of it.  For years
I put away a little every year,
but her family was shamed by the bare grave,
and hadn't they blamed me for everything,
so now she has a cross.  Crude, rigid, nothing
human on it, flat dead tree on the hill,
it's what you see for miles, it's all I see.
Symbol of hope, the priest said, clearing his throat,
and the rain came down and washed the formal flowers.
I guess he thinks that dusk is just like dawn.
I guess he had forgot about the nails.

Ring, damn you!  Ring!