Stages of Life

Why should I grow old and gray,
The twilight at the close of day,
The rose, full-blown, that falls away
To dew-damped grass, to there decay,
Rather than the early morn
When the sun the sun is being  born--
Stay, O stay, eternal spring,
And let me dance 'round the fairies' ring
1957
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There's no safe port in a thunderstorm
No sheltered cove my craft can gain
No mother's arms to keep me warm
And hide me from the pelting rain

No tranquil bay to moor the night,
No overgrowth of reed and cane,
No lover's arms to hold me tight
To keep me from the throbbing pain

No hope of respite from the sky
No harbor for my tiny boat
No one to heed my desperate cry
And keep my sinking bark afloat
1970
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I don't drink beer
I don't drink wine
But ply me with chocolate
And I am thine
2019

Computer, Nourishment, Eyesight, Analysis, Doctor

Ho-hum. the Mac will have to go into Click Computer Repair. It's been corrupted by some sort of bug that Fiorella can't get rid of, even with Command-Option-Escape.
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Fio decided it was a total waste of gas to drive eight miles into town to buy a Moonpie, so she bought two of them.
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Thank you, Mother, for teaching your daughter how to sew. Now if Fio can just thread the dang needle!
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Daughter seems to be somewhat appalled by the coldness of the short-short Fio posted yesterday, but  Fio writes her short-shorts with the coldly analytic side of her nature. Strangely enough, she does the same thing when she is drawing nudes. Naked models are not people to her, but challenging lines and poses.
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Wish Fiorella well. She goes in to see her heart doctor today, and he'll probably scold her about rejecting the home finger-pricking set up. Too bad. Fio is a doctor, not a nurse.

Unbirth

       Once upon a time, there was a skinny young man who hated his boss for chastising him, so on a dark night when his employer was working late, the young man decided to burglarize his house. As he was stuffing a pillowcase full of heavy silver, the boss's fat wife, whom the skinny young man hated because she had been kind to him, came down the stairs. Dropping the pillowcase with a clatter, he rushed the woman, held a knife to her throat, and forced her into a nearby bedroom for punishment. She was twice his size, but because he was a man and had a knife, she was at his mercy.
       "I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!" he chanted as he pulled her legs apart, held down her arms, and attacked her ruthlessly.
       "I love you, I love you, I love you," she whispered as her great, motherly womb accepted his masculine rage, then, in rhythm with his every stroke, absorbed him into herself until he was no more.
       Afterwards, the woman lay still for a few minutes, then lurched out of bed and walked down the hall, emptied the silver out of  the pillowcase, and put it all back back in its proper place again.

This short-short may seem familiar to you because it's a revision of a piece Fiorella wrote several years ago. She hopes she's improved it.

From Occupation to Meditation

You ask what Fiorella does--
She writes--on paper, cloth, paper towels, napkins, canvas, wood, wallboard, cardboard, Kleenexes, toilet paper, sidewalks, walls, and whatever else is available.  Her implements are pens, pencils, crayons, oils, acrylics, water colors, chalk, charcoal, lipsticks, oils, acrylics, and her own fingertips. And what does she produce? Poems, short stories, books, booklets, articles, newsletters, essays, charts, songs, plays, letters, lists,  instructional pamphlets, sketches, illustrations, paintings, advertisements, blogs, posts, plays, signs, and whatever else takes her fancy.
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Long ago, when Fio worked full-time in the Sears credit department and attended college part-time (having to miss out on two of her five classes twice a week), there were three of us who used to stick together--Virginia Tschatschula, Anne Chapman, and yours truly.  Anne died early from cancer and Virginia departed this mortal coil four years ago, which leaves one to go--but not without a fight.
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 I must tidy up my garden
And plant new flower beds
I must water all the roses
And trim the privet hedge

I must cover up the marks of
Intruders in the night
I must rake the footprints smooth in
My garden of delight

I must bury all my old dreams
And hide them from my view
When I clear the harm of trespass
Then I can plant anew

(Obviously, this poem has nothing whatever to do with gardening)

From Pharmacy to Poetry

What's going on with Walgreens Pharmacy, which seems to have lapsed into dissarary since the old crew was retired? You've already heard Fiorella's reports on the under-staffing and lack of accommodations for the handicapped, but now she's now she's heard about a communication problems with customers.She herself has had a prescription problem that she's throwing into her doctor's lap to handle, but a friend of her's is having a hard time being added to her husband's account. She was told that it would take a week,but instead of adding her to theaccount,Walgreen's announced it had updated the family's street address (where they've lived for thirty-four years). You'd think Walgreens, would welcome a new addition to the account-- the family pays its bills and has a good credit rating--so what's the problem?
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If you want to know how to avoid being caught in a mass shooting, jot down Fio's every word. First, avoid all public gatherings--graduations, rallies, music performances,sporting events. and the like Second, never go shopping, even for food. Third, stay away from all places of worship. Four, don't attend any reunions or family get-togethers. Five, build yourself a hut on a mountain top and stay there for the rest of your life. Or work your tail off to get gun control!
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Fio spent yesterday afternoon going through all her old poems that she could find, although there are probably plenty more floating around the universe and a fair number, mostly political, locked away in the archives of Facebook--not that anyone cares. Poetry, especially that which is rhythmed and rhymed, is passe nowadays.
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Speaking of poetry, here's Fiorella's latest of-the-top-of-her-head  rhyme regarding you-know-who:
      Faker, faker, call the baker
      Roll him up in butcher paper
      Light the oven, close the door
      Cook him twice and then some more
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One of Fio's few blank verse poems, written many, many years ago:
      Dreams are like bubbles
      That floats ever upward
      Until they burst
      And as they shatter
      My heart shatters too

Five Plus One

Thanks to your prayers, Fiorella's missing libreta has shown up again. Where did she find it, you ask--well, uh, er, ahem,  under a wad of papers in the passenger seat of the Miata.
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When Fio is richie, rich, rich, she will buy herself a computer slave so she never has to deal with those stupid machines again.
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Nazi Germany
     They looked the other way
     And went about their day
     Because it was not they
     Being hauled away
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People come in an array of hues--black, yellow, brown, and white, red and blue. Let us embrace each other and be glad of it.
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Just when Fio thought she was finished with her post-death duties for the day and had settled down into working on her own writing for the first time in months, the phone rang. It was a call from an on-line company called Evine that Husband had an account with.  Apparently he'd bought an Invicta watch from them so now, for some unknown reason,Fio has to send out yet another death certificate. f
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How wonderful--but exhausting. Fiorella spent at least an hour trying to trace down all her short stories on her Mac and only found five of them (but she knows there are more somewhere in the machine.) Along the way, she discovered a forgotten cache of poetry, which she promptly downloaded. You've probably figured it out--Fio is thinking about publishing everything herself. That way, it will be out there in the universe, whether anyone reads it or not.

Just a One-Hour Trip....

Fiorella went out for an hour to do a few errands and ended up out for three hours, with the hot sun beating down on her the whole time. The trip plan had been so simple--first, she'd stop at Fed-Ex Kinko's for the all-knowing guys there to take a picture of the picture she had taken of her driver's license, which had to be enclosed in her letter to TDAmeritrade for her to able able to claim the proceeds of the sale of Husband's stocks.  Second, she would drop by Click Computer Repair for the wonder-wizards behind the counter to un-freeze her stupid Mac, which had decided to play coy with her mid-morning.

Just two simple trips. Except that she spent far too long in Fed-Ex because Joe had a holy-hell time getting the photo retaken and printed--apparently, drivers' licenses are not made with photo shoots in mind. Finally back in her car, Fio bolstered herself for another snafu as she drove over to Clicks--where everything went surprisingly well. Maybe the rest of her jaunt would go okay, Fio thought as she head toward H-E-B to mail the envelope containing her precious carefully-worded letter and athe portrait of her driver's license. Then she realized the flap of the envelope wasn't holding. No prob--she was on her way to H-E-B anyway, so she might as well go into the store and pick up a roll of Scotch tape to seal the flap shut. And while she was there, she could get the New Dawn she'd forgotten about buying yesterday, and, to hit the magic "3" mark, maybe a bag of Pinwheels.

After paying for her bounty, Fiorella, wearing out by then, staggered outside into a high 90s' temperature, slumped into her car, and drove off, totally forgetting she had planned to drop The Envelope in the H-E-B post box. Nothing to do but circle around a couple of blocks to the main post office and make use of the drive-thru. Mission accomplished, Fio headed home. But the vegetation on the sides of the road didn't look familiar. Eek! She'd turned onto Leander Road  instead of Hwy 29. Nothing to do but keep driving until she could find a driveway, turn around, and return I-35 again. Four Pinwheels were missing in action by the time Fio got home, and she had GERD symptoms half the night.
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Pray for Fiorella. She has misplaced--or lost--her libreta amarillla, the tablet she depends on to keep up with her commitments and self-assignments. She's put together una lista nueva from waste basket shreds, but there are bound to be items she's missed. 😔
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This is weird. Fio keeps having the feeling that Husband is sitting in the recliner beside her, but when she turns to discuss something with him, he's left the room.💖