Joanne Edith

"Atlas Shrugged" (Ayn Rand), in 33 words, by Joanne Edith

Defiant Dagny builds railroads, encourages entrepreneurial industrialists, and uncovers island of misfit geniuses, while finding true love with two inspirational inventors; and saving America from socialistic and economic disaster. Thank you, John Galt!

Riptides by Miranda

Riptides

Harsh cries scatter ragged thoughts
Seagulls taking sky and
Pushed back down again.
The thoughts return
As they always do
Catching me deep, hopeless and lost.
Loneliness ebbs at my feet,
Licking my toes
Leaving the sea to answer the gulls
As it roars to keens
And me
Tasting salt
And swallowing bitterness
That already my heart is choking on.
I see their faces in the roiling clouds
Remember their falseness and feeble words
And it all feels like sand grating fresh cuts.
Thunder.
In the indigo sky
Warning me to take my sorrowed soul away
But my mind will not soothe me
And my feet will not move me
As I tire
And slip below the surface.
Then the sky knows the weight of my worry
And the tears fall down at last
Smelling of rain and starry sands
And in the crackling light
The sky can see
It's not the only blue body
Far beyond reach.

Am I Blue? by Joanne Edith

Am I blue?
Loving, gifted grandsons,
Handsome husband,
Fairy tale family,
Perfect puppy!

Ah, there it is... lachrymosa.
My "Shadow", my sheltie.
Always near: my playmate, my pal, my patient.
She trusted me to care for her;
To know when to say "when".

She needed saving...she was saved;
A day, a few precious weeks...months.
She's healing, she's walking, she's eating,
She's happy!
She's gone!

A void is now, happily, filled...our perfect puppy:
Joie de vivre....ecstatic exuberance...we love him!
Still, a dull ache pulses softly beneath a smiling surface
Ever receding: open wound, scab, scar.
I am blue.

Joanne Edith

What Have We Done? by Joanne Edith

What have we done?

Our Garden of Eden, devolved into a paved paradise

Our children, forgotten aside ferrite fences

While barely-a-livestock, forced to ferret feed from crevices

What have we done?

C.D. Tolliver

Oleic Odium

The odor of death and decay fills
the proud towering edifice with mephitic vapor.
The tenants flee as if pursued by ghouls.
The grease-trap must be drained,
and the building straddles the alley.

--C.D. Tolliver

Perspective by Joanne Edith

Perspective   Designated location on rooftop deck Cut through the alley; a shortcut  Suddenly, senses under attack   The city’s underbelly! Wait to exhale... Walk faster, closer and closer to the distant pinpoint of light     Emerge, gasping, from the alley!        Exhale!  Inhale!  Breathe! Breathe in, breathe out,,revulsion recedes    Climb worn stone steps to 4th floor  Hurry! Wait! Survive - 'til day's end.   The alley awaits! Will I be chosen? Thought evolves; from alley - to ‘box’ - and back  Nausea gives way to nostalgia; powerlessness to pride Responsibility! Right! Privilege! It’s 1972 - it’s 2012: years elapse; nothing changes. Jury Duty!

Three by Virginia Walters

My identity until I was eleven was as the oldest of three kids. Our family of five fitted easily into the cab of an old Plymouth pickup: Dad at the wheel, me straddling the gear shift, brother Jim scrunched between me and Mom, who held baby sister, Pat. Of course, those were the days before seat belts and sanctions against kids in the front seat. Traffic was minor in our sparsely populated farm region and everyone drove a slow old pickup anyway. We graduated to a car when we got older and three in the back seat was anathema, so it was a deal for who got the front seat in the middle of the parents, or who got to ride shotgun if only mom were taking us someplace.

Three kids was slightly above the norm in those days. Most families had two, preferably a boy and a girl, but some ran to two of either gender. Secretly, we felt sorry for those people. How in the heck did you settle an argument if there were only two? Everyone knew majority rules, and everyone also knew to what lengths they’d go to win their side: that night’s dessert, do the dishes on off days, it really depended on what was at stake. Seeing a movie was decidedly more valuable than going to grandma’s, but both were worth more than staying home and playing cards.

The day of the announcement of the impending number four, we all had our secret thoughts: I’d not only be the oldest, I’d have responsibility. Pat would be a BIG SISTER instead of the baby, and Jim would have two little ones to protect; but one thing was for sure: The days of our identity as the Three Musketeers was nearing an end and we’d have to reform our alliances and rethink our public persona. The Fantastic Four was in the making!

VEW

Family of Three by Joanne Edith

I remember when we were a family of three.

Dad was a tile man; a hardworking, skilled craftsman who loved his work and the pleasure it brought to others. Nick was a handsome man.

Mom was a photographer, displaying her motherly pride through the artistic expression of her photography. Eileen was a classic beauty.

We were a family of three and there were photos to prove it!

There were boxes and boxes of photos. There were snapshots and enlargements, painstakingly tinted and colored (Eileen was trying her hand at various methods of color transfer development techniques). There were beautiful photos, blurry photos, masterpieces and cast-aside 'experiments'. Yet, all captured for posterity, precious moments in time.

I stare at a picture taken on a rooftop as daylight was dwindling. Mom was swaddling her infant in her arms. Dad gazed lovingly at us. What did they talk about up there on the roof that evening? Who took the picture? Was Dad reassuring her that their love could overcome the resistance from his Italian family, outraged because he married an Irish girl?

Another photo: the three of us, dressed in our Sunday best, smiling from our tentative perch in a rowboat. I was an excitable, doted-upon three- year-old. Mom must have known about my expected baby sister. Did they talk about the baby? Did we have a picnic lunch? Did we take the trolley or the Park Ave bus to the park?

I pause on the third photo, taken later that year. I was on a beautiful pony. That day, we went to a recording booth where I sang "California, Here I Come" and "'A' You're Adorable", dedicated to my new baby sister, Eileen!

I wish I could time-travel and sit-in on our conversation. I would thank them and reassure them that I would love my sister, and later my brother; and that our special threesome would inevitably evolve to another, better model - Eileen, Nick and the three kids.

Retirement 101 by Joanne Edith

I am new to this retirement gig.

On March 6th, after 44 years, I happily said goodbye to the corporate world:

  I said goodbye to the 2 hr. commute to Manhatten.

  I said goodbye to sleepless Sunday nights and stressful Friday executive meetings.

  I said goodbye to PC's and Blackberrys.

  I said goodbye to red-eye flights from LAX.

  I said goodbye to global teleconferences, performance plans and progress reports.

I said hello to lazy mornings in bed with a new puppy.

I said hello to days with nothing on the schedule.

I said hello to grandsons 'popping in' without checking first to see if Grandma was "free".

I said hello to whipping up breakfast, for my 'returning-from-a-jog' daughter.

I said hello to morning bubble baths, accompanied by the  beautiful music of backyard birds.

I bake bread on weekdays.

I go to the gym when I want to.

I realize that I don't need to save my chores for weekends.

I take relaxed walks with my new puppy.

I take golf lessons and swimming lessons.

I knit, I play piano, I sing, I bake, I shop, and I smile.

Grandma, wife, mother, sister, puppy 'human', mentor, musician, gardener, homemaker, photographer, journalist, and person are  roles I can now embrace without encumbrance.

Oh yes, this retirement gig is new to me, but I'm adjusting well to the transition from my corporate, professional identity to the me I always knew was lurking inside.  I now have permission to become all that I can be.

 "Free to be you and me" has meaning once again, to this 'old' (only as old as I feel) dog.

Plumbed Deep

It wasn’t the first time Mr. Pine, armed with duct tape and bailing wire, waded across the basement to the unidentifiable blob spewing water.

“They say you can fix anything with this stuff,” he said with unflagging conviction.

--C.D. Tolliver

Mindy

Crashing through the door to find him limp on the mattress, our ears were still ringing. This time we waited. Ninety seconds until he rolled over laughing and pretended to shoot us, too.

Eleven by C. Shaw

It wasn’t the first time. She’d return in nine hours when her shift ended. “Shopping like a rich girl,” my mom laughed.

I’d watch the mall fill and empty again, weighing my loneliness against the threat of strangers.