Entering in you find a scene of order;

cleanliness is best, old ways, archival.

No scrap sets loose outside its borders;

prepared and sorted for your arrival.

 

At first these chores remain a daily theme;

your well-being, uppermost priority.

Nursery, kitchen, bathroom, spotless clean;

unflinchingly scoured, no glance of pity.

 

Then exhaustion eats away intention;

lids not fastened, diapers miss the pail.

The parents perfect fairy tale, pretension;

images of counters not wiped down,  assail.

 

Soon the scraps of daily life accumulate,

Corners, shelves, piled high in towering stacks;

unfinished projects of someday thrown out

in reckless spates of self-recrimination.

Neglected expectations looking back.

 

Grown self remembers nothing of this, just

recall sunny days laughing play ’round your bed.

Your parents let go of idealistic bliss,

learned practical reality instead.

 

The Old Wive’s Tales spoke most tellingly,

“A child must eat two pounds of dirt before it’s  grown.”

must have been adhered to, even if unwillingly;

you grew up a wild seed, as though unintentionally sown.

 

Yet, the world you inhabited has changed

in ways undreamt by those who came before.

Skies, less friendly, far more severe, now hang

above; their cloaking power shields no more.

 

This invasive ultra-violet spectrum;

undreamed, unexpected, unwarned of;

no meteorologists speculation

consumed your high-school aged attention.

 

Now add to fearsome rays of  UV-B

(no slathered sun-screen will you from this protect),

this conjoined threat, the deadly UV-C.

The stratosphere, it’s weakened net, suspect.

 

“Sub-arctic ozone hole has closed,” they said.

Then what new forces  are applied to bring

this present world of fire and sun-burnt head?

What Nemesis has brought it’s poisoned sting?

 

The streaks of yellowed leaves on branch and tree,

the deadened bushes in your neighborhood,

no chances of recovery appears;

once healthy grown, since before your child-hood.

 

But no, this menace isn’t born of man

Nor chemical, nor min’ral laden trails,

No o’er-arching depopulation plan

could bring this disaster onto man, so frail.

 

The very earth on which you first rode bike;

spun cart-wheels, stalked hand-stands begins to shift.

Holes,  big as houses ope’ in the earth like

yawning caverns threat’ning souls to sift.

 

The biggest river’s course dries up in places

where deepest flow should boat assist;

nor record flooding waters show their trace

downstream inside old banks were once to list.

 

Where once, a thunder-storm (requirement),

the after-image rainbows now appears

with dry puff-clouds for accompaniment;

a puzzlement of mystery to fear.

 

Compasses of youth point not toward Big-dipper,

but just off-angled toward the southeast,

moving further that direction every year;

These heavens not fixed, nor constant in the least.

 

Tell then, what happened to the world we knew;

The ever constant state of slow decay?

No trusted word is spoken now of Nibiru,

whose slingshot orbit bends ’round darkened day.

 

The other voices sang its imminence,

repeated cycle told by ancient clay;

of  preparations we thought, “There’s no need.”

We failed to heed the warnings at the Bay.

 

Every day brings news of fresh disasters.

Belching mountains, once thought dead, speak plain;

we must prepare, these, our sure forecasters.

Volcanic ash spreads far with acid rain.

 

Your world, unquiet, strains against her bounds.

Rocking chains of gravity, she trembles, then subsides.

Blasting forth in strangled screams her trumpet sounds;

again she moves, she stumbles, heeds command.

 

He calls to her while riding Nemesis

in wild orbit, swinging sceptered load

‘midst open streams of radiation; hisses…

She tumbles to the rhythms known of old.

 

If you this mating should survive, recall

that warning you were given.  The future

of your progeny depends on having all

this information in a form that is assured.

 

No woodland paper will survive that journey

into the dark abyss, and its return.

Leave solid notice in earth’s rocks deeply worried,

Record the cycle of the earth it churned.

 

Ancient tablets made of etched and fired clay

created for endurance, simplified;

tell stories of the sure and certain day

when earth again will heed the call, and

on Nibiru’s tail, will take the wild ride.

 

 

Ellen M Story , Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc. May 2018.

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ellen M Story, Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc with appropriate, and specific direction to the original content.

 

 

It is Mother’s Day.

My daughters are grown

and have their separate lives.

I am alone with my cats

and I am all right with that.

 

It isn’t necessary for me to have my daughters around me

for me to be glad that I had them.

It is enough for me to know that they are safe

and mostly well, if not always ecstatic.

 

Some people feel sad for me that they are not near by

or too involved in their lives to be able to be with me today.

I am sorry that I am too insolvent to be able to be with them

on this day or many others, and  I miss getting to visit with my Grandchildren.

 

But that’s alright too, because for everything there is a season,

and this is a season for self-reflection.

This May I take stock and sort out what’s necessary

and what’s desirable, from what’s neither one of those.

 

The necessary things are the arrival of my children;

their growth, their learning, and their eventual understanding.

Desirable things include having the opportunity to teach them;

my love for them, and my prayers for them.

 

If these things are accomplished before I leave here, it is enough.

My journey is intimately tied to their lives.

I would not have a Happy Mother’s day

without my daughters have their joy too. Happy Mother’s Day, one and all.

 

Emaria, May  13, 2018

Love is a train wreck

on a car on a crossing

collision of souls

© E.Maria Story and EMariaEnterprises, LLC  2012.

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to E. Maria Story and EMariaEnterprises, LLC with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

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We move about almost in ellipse,

dancing alone against a backdrop of stars,

our swaying motion dictated by the mass of those nearest us.

 

Our sun is Mother, about whom we all revolve.

Her shining power wraps us in streams of heat.

We are tempered by the cold, icy void behind us.

 

As light turns  leaves on tree and flower without intent,

the rays of her regard reach into our souls to lift and warm;

our growth accomplished in proximity.

 

All unaware, her nurture has bound our lives together.

Near or far, existence in our separate orbits made possible

by the strength of her gravity.

 

Emaria, May 2018

Ellen M Story , Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc. April 2018.

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ellen M Story, Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc with appropriate, and specific direction to the original content.

 

The family is spread out like popcorn

scattered by  the violence of individual effort

into it’s several different places,

but held together in a pan with walls of steel

that withstand the fiercest heat.

 

We are fiercely independent.

We have our own lives, our own thoughts, our own feelings.

We are so separate that we rarely speak to each other,

except through Mother.

 

We call her to find out the news of what each is doing,

accept her version of how things are with us,

even though we know she doesn’t always see things

the same as our reality is reflected.

 

We choose not to communicate directly amongst ourselves;

taking the short cut of a call home instead,

and keep the connection Mother has provided.

What will we do without her

who has been the touchstone of our existence?

 

Emaria, May 2018

© Ellen M Story, and emariaenterprises, llc 2018 and Ellen M. Lattz, 2018

Poems and artwork are by Ellen M. Story, 2018, and Ellen M. Lattz, 2018

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ellen M. Story and Ellen M. Lattz, and emariaenterprises with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

 

 

 

 

 

I know that what is going on now

in our schools is ominous…

When I was a little girl in school

we used to do atomic bomb drills.

 

We were told if we saw a flash

we should duck under our desks

and hide from the flying debris

of the shattering windows.

 

We weren’t told that if we saw the flash

we would all die of radiation exposure

a little more slowly than those

who were killed all at once.

 

There are a lot of things we don’t tell our children;

sometimes it’s for the best, sometimes it’s not.

Mostly they don’t want to listen

to what you say anyway.

 

By Ellen Lattz, April 2018

@ By Ellen M. Lattz, April 2018

Ellen M Story , Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc. April 2018.

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ellen M Story, Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc with appropriate, and specific direction to the original content.

 

There are daughters

who are clever, and

win arguments, but never

learn to value what is near;

 

There are daughters

who are stable, and take care

of business, but are not able

to forgive a sibling who is dear;

 

There are daughters

who are patient, and

attend to to every instant of  their

child’s every effort to steer clear;

 

There are daughters

who are passionate, and

take stands against oppression

but cannot see the truth in all their peers;

 

You, however daughter,

are all these things and then some,

even when you’re acting winsome

you are awesome! Never fear.

 

As a Mother you are able

to diagnose the trouble, that

a rash and swollen eyelids signal

allergies.

Salvation from the itching

is what you searched for in the kitchen

when you made home cooked meals for

little ones.

As an artist you concocted

double entendre’s in the journals

given as gifts between mere mortals,

with good cheer.

With a camera and a car

you have journeyed near and far

to be with sun and moon and

shining star.

You have braved the burning desert;

by your own self you have treasured

both the beauty and the solitude;

yours alone.

Your bravery is laudable,

your comedy is laughable,

your costuming commendable;

You triumph here.

 

As your Mother

I am hoping that with issues,

finally coping, I am able

to live up to what

you need.

 

@ By Ellen M. Lattz, April 12, 2018

Ellen M Story , Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc. April 2018.

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ellen M Story, Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc with appropriate, and specific direction to the original content.

 

My Mother used to quote an old saying that was a popular axiom

in a generation recovering from serious amounts of want.

“You can fall in love with a rich man as easily as a poor man.”

What she meant by this was that we shouldn’t overlook the one’s who

choose to do enough work to achieve their dreams,

even though it means spending less time together.

 

And while you’re at it, you shouldn’t underestimate your own strengths.

Go after your dreams too. Don’t settle for one who only admires the you

that you presently are, but look for a person who appreciates you now,

and knows that there will be an even better you that you will become

on your own time and in your own way.

 

Of course,  in my youth I got that backward.  I thought

that not judging a man meant that I should find a poor man.

poor in heart, poor in spirit, poor in purse, but who I saw potential in.

In other words, someone to change into someone else;

Someone that they weren’t already, and maybe didn’t want to become.

Maybe I should have checked with them first, about what they wanted to do.

 

How rude.

 

I should have looked for one’s who were already what I wanted in the first place,

and then worked on myself to be the best whole me that I could be.

Or just worked on me in the first place,

without looking for someone else.

Let the one who wants what I want

and who wants what I am

come find me.

 

by  Ellen M. Lattz, April/May 2018

Ellen M Story , Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc. April 2018.

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ellen M Story, Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc with appropriate, and specific direction to the original content.

You know that song from CATS?

The one about the scruffy cat

that was once glamorous?

I feel like that sometimes.

 

I look like that most of the time.

Scruffy.

I say, “It’s a choice.”

But is it?

 

Where once I was lively, I’m tired now.

Down and blue.

Been there a few times….

Where the lively hit the wall.

 

All that I was is laying there,

sprawled out, face down.

Curled up in the gutter

Like a road-killed cat.

 

By Ellen Lattz, March 2018

 

 

 

Ellen M Story , Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc. May 2016.

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ellen M Story, Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc with appropriate, and specific direction to the original content.

Up here, as I part the branches of the elm tree,

the ancient nordic symbol of female power

wraps its sibilant welcome around my trembling rage.

My seven year old self has only just begun

to understand about injustice.

 

Up here I am apart from everything down there:

Squinty eyed siblings, scheming to take your freedom;

walled off Parents, sunk in their prisons of despair;

teeming schools of careless classmates

taunting you with their trite barbs, easy cruelties.

 

Up here I am a part of the endless skies.

The wind is in my hair, and in my nose, and in my ears.

The leaves whisper timelessly of growth and living.

My eyes find solace in the company of ants

endlessly searching for new sustenance.

 

Up here, my part is clinging tight to the rough bark.

The rounded limbs, the gently bending branches

hold my sleight weight with ease.

Suspended in this pocket of temporary sanctuary;

there is peace, there is calm, there is strength.

 

Reclaiming myself, I descend again into the storm.

 

@ Ellen Lattz, March 2018

Ellen M Story , Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc. May 2016.

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ellen M Story, Ellen M. Lattz at emariaenterprises, llc with appropriate, and specific direction to the original content.