For My Friend-Six Years and...

Every now and then certain people come in your life and brighten it.  Certain people come in your life and make a huge dent.  A friend and colleague is leaving her position to move on to better things. I am happy for her, but I am sad for all the wreckage that she has left behind. I am that wreckage.  I truly won't be the same without her support, laugh, and bouncing of ideas.  I never knew that six and a half years ago, that moving from a family at Cedar Brook Elementary, I would find another.  In Alana Morris I have found a true kindred spirit.  She has been a great friend to me.  We worked in the trenches together for six and a half years.  Alas, she has to move forward and so do I.  I cherish the fun times and the crazy times from netbooks, to Loretta, from fresas de chocolate to Dominoes Pizza with crazy cheese bread.  I will remember these times with a smile and some laughter.  For me, I will keep in contact with her on Texans Sundays and lots of text messages that turn into poetry and late phone calls on the way home from work.  This cannot be the end, only the continuance of a journey, a journey through literacy, friendship and just being human!  Love ya Alana!  This one's for you. (It is only a draft!)

Six Years and…

By Maureen Ucles

Six years and a half—

Could have sworn it

Just yesterday

We were workin’

Bouncing ideas

Free flowin’

Oh no!

Step around, jump, skip

Whatever you can

Don’t step

on that crack

Break your mamma’s back

Or my heart

Whichever comes first…

Six years and a half

Can’t remember it all

Can never go back

I just wanna

Slow down time

Tick-toc  tick-toc

You don’t stop

Tickety-tickety toc

Sounds rackin’ my brain

Feel a little convoluted

Little insane

Just can’t see it

My way

Six years and a half

Running through

Not walking--

BOOM!

Time flies

Fun in the Sun

Always a laugh

Borrowed

On clearance

Now gone-

Past layaway

Six years and counting

Why does it have to end…

this way?

Hard

So very hard

To say

Goodbye and

Set the past free

What it can be

What it was

Now

Without me

Just gone, gone, gone

Cold chills

Flowing

Uphill

In my veins

Not so easy

With all my lungs

Tired of breathing

Still wheezing

Allergies

Asthma

Such a catastrophe

I am

Without ya

Six years and a half

Don’t really have the Math

Cannot compute

This craziness

Why do you have to flee?

No sense

Is this making

And me?

I am not faking

Cannot seem to wake

From this nightmare

I am ‘a living

This six years and a half

Done gone

Like  cold coffee

Down the drain

With those grinds

Six stinkin’ years

No more

And and

a half

To be continued