Son,

another year has gone by

and today you turn twelve.

They told me time would fly,

to enjoy every minute

because before I knew it . . .

you'd be all growed up.

Looking at you today,

I know what they mean!

Please know that I love you very much.

And, I'm so proud of the young man you are growing in to.

Your wit,

your kindness,

your creativity,

your intelligence,

your tenacity

and your zest for life amaze me every day.

YOU amaze me every day!

Always shine bright my darling boy.

Happy 12th birthday, son . . .

My pen, she’s almost done
Writing on the current page;
Few more scrawls and soon
She’d be turning another leaf.

The next leaf, smooth and glossy,
It’s the diary’s thirtieth page;
Still a blank, clean surface
On which my pen’d pirouette

Maybe with a black or blue ink
Or why not red, pink or green;
With lines graceful and thin
Turns planned and disciplined.

But will my pen be singing
Or perhaps be a-crying?
Will she leave marks of laughter
Or perhaps stains of pain?

Will her scrawls be legible
Or hopelessly unfathomable?
Will her lines and loops be meaningful
Or simply pathetic scribbles? .

.
//Sherma E. Benosa
14 October 2007; 1:07pm 

.

.

Scrawling Still…

Remember the tub in the kitchen
And the floorboards that kept us thin
The front room that faced drug deals and orange safety lights
The back room that the Flat Earth Society named the capital of our 2,000 Nights
The calypso beat of heart on elbow
Cheap St. Mark's champagne and my first stab at nachos
Every breath
Every breath
Every breath
You take
Remember
The one night in all of our six-year reign
On the Korvette's rug with the good champagne
It was the night the radio played Every Breath You Take
Like 100 times in a row
Sting has been quoted as saying it's a song about a stalker, but we were too dumb to know
You don't know this part
But when you left you broke my heart
When you left I bought a cactus and placed it on the sill by the fire-escape window
Every night after temping I'd sit on the couch and watch it grow
Remember
The guy on the second floor who stole our electricity?
In a birthday card, twenty-two years ago, twenty-three?
You wrote
That he looked a lot like me

Steve Hellyard Swartz is a poet, filmmaker, and teacher. His poems have been published in Best Poem, The Kennesaw Review, Haggard and Halloo, and switched-on guttenberg. He has won Honorable Mention in the 2007 Allen Ginsberg Poetry Awards and the Anna Davidson Rosenberg Poetry Awards. In 2008, he will be published in The Paterson Review and the Southern Indiana Review.

Blustering winds, howl like wildcats
Blowing pitch black coal furnace soot
onto pristine white fresh fallen snow
Black and white, extremes amidst life's limitless color

Most things, still waiting for spring to be born
4:14 AM, a tiny cry breaks the early morning air
Not winter's angry wind, but a newborn
Taking life's first frightening breath

And from that first breath, five hundred million more
Each a new beginning, strung together
like an unimaginably long pearl necklace
Worn as only a man at fifty-seven can wear

You look back, trying to understand
But you never really do
All you know is it all starts with a single breath, and
that is also how it finally ends

Mom and Dad so happy, you were a girl
On your forehead, a pretty golden curl
Eyes of blue, cheeks so rosy
Fast alseep with Mom, oh so cozy

Not long before, you were walking
And just as fast, you were talking
Dolls and girly things you loved
Such a little lady indeed, my beloved

Dad, a fireman, was your hero
Fighting fires, thank goodness no Ground Zero
Mom, your daily keeper
Glad she was, you were a good sleeper

In no time flat, you were off to school
Always you observed, the Golden Rule
You grew so fast, and oh so pretty
I wish I knew you then, my what a pity

Always goals, you had in mind
Things to do, new places to find
You loved to smile, laugh and play
Hard you worked everyday

Through school you flew, then off to college
There you gained much new knowledge
A heart of gold, you always had
Just like Ken, your good ole Dad

By some miracle, we found each other
So happy we've been, one and another
I count you as my lucky star
Your eyes they twinkle, from afar

Today we celebrate your birth
With rubies, diamonds and some mirth
On this day, we honor you
With this birthday, your life renews