I Can't Write

till my new eyes tell the story of 2025

I can’t write until I look back at 2025 with new eyes

new eyes I got for Christmas

Cataracts shattered, new lenses fixed…

with these eyes I need to look back at the clusterfuck of 2025

before I can fully arrive in 2026

I can’t write in 2026 while I carry the weight of this wild grief, anger and shock

till my bones have spoken about where I have gone, what I have seen

By January, we’d been in the rental house over a year

while rebuilding our home which was supposed to take eight months

(People smile and say “it always takes twice as long”

but it’s not something to smile about

there is schadenfreude in that grimace, isn’t there?

if you’re fortunate enough to build a house you don’t get to complain?)

maybe

still

the landlord was a dick

he blocked my number

he refused to fix the dryer and the dishwasher

he jacked the rent by $1,000 without warning

oh wait and and and

on the seventh day of that new year, 2025,

fire marched down the Santa Monica mountains

and took the Pacific Palisades with it

Breathe in: Gone is the main street

gone is Pali Elementary where I was poet in residence, 1988-90

Breath out: The fire marched and raged down to

the pacific coast highway and took the Malibu Feed Bin

where I would stop for Betadyne to treat Bodhi’s scurf

for salt licks that were dark brown with extra vitamins and minerals

fly spray and fly masks and a yummy vanilla goop called Sound for their hooves

Oh, and Mrs. Pastures horse cookies, too

All gone

In a flash of nature doing what she does

Did they have the baby ducks and chickens

in the big metal tub by the cash register

when the fire rolled down Topanga Canyon?

I haven’t driven the coast to the horses for a year now

I haven’t groomed Freckles, my replacement horse

Karen’s horse, not mine

I haven’t picked a hoof or pulled off a tick

I haven’t brushed his mane and tail

I haven’t crossed the creeks that appear after the rains come

I haven’t seen coyote standing in the middle of the path

staring us down

and I haven’t seen snake dashing off under a rock

We watched from the balcony of the house

as the Eaton Fire marched to the east and we waited, wondering:

should be pack a go-bag?

Friends back east were telling me to drive south

Get a hotel, rent a different house

We stayed, breathing in people’s appliances and blown up cars

House cleaning devices, clothes, hundreds of small animals

their little legs to short to outrun the freight train of fire

or their wings not strong enough to fly away fast enough

Then?

Then?

Oh, god, our rescue pup; the wild Maddie Parker

with Cushings and renal failure… her meds by June looked like

AM

Vetoryl 10 mg with food

Benazepril half tab

Thyro-tabs 0.2 mg

Gabapentin 100 mg

Azodyl one capsule

PM

All the same but no benazepril

And adding norvsac 1/2 tab

And wow, those meds worked till they didn’t

She could fly down the stairs of the rental house!

then suddenly she couldn’t

and three days later we were sitting at VCA

on the floor

taking quizzes online for “How to Know When To Kill Your Dog”

and she passed all the tests for: it’s time to let her go

We took a last walk on the hot sidewalk

and I held her while they -

ah, my hands are too heavy to type

I need to lie down and weep

I breathe and lean into such sorrow, such hurt

Her pawprint in on the dining room table in the new house

We moved in on July 7th, just me, my husband and Murphy

our survivor dog

nearly blind with cataracts, deaf as a stone

There were five different teams still working on the house

and the trapdoor to the California basement was open

she followed me down the hall from the bedrooms

I thought the door was closed to keep her safe

but it didn’t close properly

Nothing was right about this house!

I hear a shriek and it was Murphy

she fell down the stairs till the electrician caught her

and I began to scream

holding her

thinking she was dying

I rushed her to the ER

her back was fractured

T-11

oh how she suffered

I carried her everywhere for five weeks, six weeks

while I unpacked and lived life

lived this impossible life in this impossible city

under the presidency of an impossible monster

Whatever certainty we had was…

gone

then, Murphy began to stand

I took her for physical therapy and learned what to do at home

and within a few weeks

she could walk on her own

It was a miracle.

Now, she can run a little when a cookie is involved!

Then, then, oh then

I found a puppy but I thought Murphy was too weak for a puppy

I cried, I wanted that dog

I let go, I let go

then, another pup found me

a little black and white pup who looked into my soul

from my computer screen

and even though her rescue name was Mary Kate (of couse her sister was… Ashely)

her voice came to me, clear as day and said

I’m Poppy

I’m yours.

Come find me

and I did and so the last months of this ridiculous year

were spent ignoring the world news

and training a four month ball of fur that licks and licks and nibbles

and so I hold grief and joy, grief and joy

Oh, I find myself looking at houses in Europe

New Zealand

my mantra: anywhere but here, anywhere but here

as we slide into fascism

and anyone can be pulled from their car and shot

as if we were living Schindler’s List in real time

Sadly, I thank god I never had children; wouldn’t wish this on the young

I knew there was an apocalypse coming

I dreamed it many times over

Everyone got sick of hearing my apocalypse fears…

but they came, anyway

and now, maybe now, I can send the second manuscript

to my designer and on to the publisher

and maybe now I can write freely of The Third Horse

and other things

Maybe now, just for now, I will finish decorating a house

in a city I no longer wish to live in…

for now

just for now

just one day at a time

one breath in and out, up and down

belly rises and falls

and I can sigh