Relationships | pictured words

I am not there

I Am Not There

I am not there, where you are.
I try to understand through your eyes.
Through your heart.
But I am not there, where you are.

Sometimes I think, perhaps, maybe
we are experiencing life
in multiverse.

I am not convinced it even exists.

But
I am not there, where you are.
I look at what you look at,
but I don’t see what you see.
I listen to what you listen to,
but I don’t hear what you hear.

And you are not here, where I am.
You look at what I look at,
but you don’t see what I see.
You listen to what I listen to,
but you don’t hear what I hear.
You are not here, where I am.

And I am not there.

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Eye of the Beholder

Eye of the Beholder

Some of the most
physically gorgeous
sincere
generous
intelligent
strongest
kindest women I know —
women I have the privilege of loving
and being loved by —

scream.

Not with their voices

but with their color
covering
accent
mother tongue.

They scream,
Foreigner!
Criminal!
Unsafe!
Unwelcome!

The beautiful truths in their hearts
are misperceived.
They are viewed as ugly lies
in the eyes of the listeners
who hear only what they are told
to hear.

If only you knew them.
If only you were willing
to spend time
communicating
communing
sharing food
exchanging smiles
searching their eyes
tracing their hearts
experiencing their generosity,

your hate and fear would
shut up
shut down.

Your heart and home would
open
expand
make way.

You would hear not screams, but
intelligent ideas
endearing emotions
liberal benevolence
soothing sentiments

and you would do anything in your power
to protect their lives and their hearts,
and protect your relationship with them.

Anything.

© Marie Elena Good 2025

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Welcome (Gogyohka for immigrants and refugees)

Photo by Ahmed akacha: https://www.pexels.com/photo/men-holding-his-daughter-on-a-campsite-19263993/

When I come home,
I lock my door.
When you arrive,
I’m committed to open my door
and unlock my heart.

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Us

We were all so close, growing up. And not that we didn’t remain so, but, you know, life. But now, we’ve made one another a priority. We have monthly lunches, and in-between coffees that last three hours and feed our souls. We laugh. Reminisce. Talk current events. Encourage one another. Speak truth in love as needed. Share one another’s lives. Fill gaps.

binding, fastening,
gathering, interfacing,
adhering, pinking

© Marie Elena Good, 2024

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December 10, 2023

December, 2023

Seated in my comfortable chair
across from my adorned and
glowing Christmas tree,
there is a sweet hush to my home.
Most of my shopping is done.
I’m planning a small Christmas Eve
gathering with family I was born into,
and new-found loves who may
not speak English well,
but speak love fluently.

Yesterday morning,
sweet, colorful cookies were
trayed and displayed. Many came
to make purchases for this season’s
celebrations. The money,
not enough to cover the costs
of war. The sweet aromas,
not enough to cover the stench
of death in the nostrils of those
who were able to escape, let alone
waft to where unwarranted revulsion
continues to slaughter and steal.

I relax, plan, shop, decorate,
and enjoy these sweet friends
I never would have known,
if not for their unfathomable plight.
And I beg forgiveness
for too easily shoving aside
the tempest that wells within –
for my inability to calm the one they live with
every waking moment.

© Marie Elena Good, 2023

#glorytoUkraine

September 27, 2020

HANDS I USED TO HOLD

I grasped Mom’s finger –
stared into her loving eyes –
my first breath of air.

As a child, always
held her hand to cross the street
and for bedtime prayer.

Sometimes as a teen
I would grasp her hand as we
walked on Naples’ beach.

Elderly, and soon
to pass, she gripped my hands as
though to save herself

as sensation of
falling overtook her, and
she needed grounding.

An honor to hold
dying hands of one who held
my hands in her womb.

© Marie Elena Good, 2020

2 Comments

September 20, 2020

Two Sisters in Three Chapters

Chapter 1. Rain.

The day I was born,
it rained hard on my sister …
submerging her soul.

Chapter 2. Wombs.

Her first pregnancy’s
uniqueness dimmed, when I found
myself pregnant, too.

Pregnant together
again. A son for me. A
tragic loss for her.

Simultaneous
third pregnancies perhaps seemed
a cruel joke, to her.

Chapter 3. Lost and Found.

In thirty-five days,
we lost Mom and Dad, and found
a common heartache.

In thirty-five days,
we lost Mom and Dad, and found
shared grief is shared love.

In thirty-five days,
we lost Mom and Dad, and found
a needed sister.

© Marie Elena Good, 2020

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August 16, 2020

Home is where I watch the Buckeyes with Dad

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As August slips into the back side,
and daylight is squeezed
into fewer hours,
I miss the distant sound
of drum cadence,
bringing in a new season.
In just a couple weeks,
Dad and I would have had
our decades-long ritual
of gathering in front of the T.V.
and saying (as though it is a surprise),
“Can you believe it is already
the first game of the season?
Didn’t the season just end?”

It didn’t matter whose home we
were in,

until it did.

Those final years, he became too frail,
and it became harder,
and then impossible,
to get Mom out the door.
So we would haul food to their place,
and hope Dad could stay awake
and out of the bathroom
for most of the game.
We hoped he could enjoy it
a fraction of what he used to.

The lamp that was part of each home
Mom and Dad called theirs
now lights my front window
as I write poems
about football
and marching bands
and drum cadence
and Mom
and Dad.

Because poems
and their light
are all that remain.

June 21, 2020

YESTERDAYS (Father’s Day 2020 Sonnet for my Dad)

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Just one more chance to hear your drum set swing,
And feel the pride well up inside my core.
And I believe I’d give most anything
To watch as you conduct a band once more.

To hear you call Mom Sweet Pea one more time,
And see the love for her in aging eyes
That cleaved to days of youth, well past their prime,
Embracing the enchantment love implies.

From time to time, I feel as though you’re near.
I sometimes hear your words play through my mind.
Oh how I’d love to linger for a year
While you are here, and death is left behind.

Though we may try to hold what fades away,
Our yesterdays were never meant to stay.

June 14, 2020

UNTITLED

OIP

“They call me Mr. Tibbs.” ~ Virgil Tibbs, In the Heat of the Night

It’s 1967. I’m 9 years old. My dad is explaining the gist of a movie I am not allowed to see. I don’t want to see the movie. More than that, I don’t want to see the nightly news.

It’s 2020. My granddaughter is 9 years old. As in ’67, I don’t want to see the news. Yet, there is a difference in the images this time: Many protesters and police officers are wearing masks, attempting to protect those they see, from a virus they can’t.

The Long Hot Summer
of Nineteen Sixty Seven
begs us take a knee.

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pictured words

Tag: Relationships

January 10, 2026

I am not there

March 16, 2025

Eye of the Beholder

December 1, 2024

Welcome (Gogyohka for immigrants and refugees)

November 17, 2024

Us

December 10, 2023

December, 2023

September 27, 2020

HANDS I USED TO HOLD

September 20, 2020

Two Sisters in Three Chapters

August 16, 2020

Home is where I watch the Buckeyes with Dad

June 21, 2020

YESTERDAYS (Father’s Day 2020 Sonnet for my Dad)

June 14, 2020

UNTITLED