On Flocking Together

By Jennifer Hunt, from the archives

Consider the flock
Of pigeons on this sidewalk.
What's their bond?
Is it their plumage? Or only
A queer attraction to the same,
Overstuffed trash bin.
As graceful as a junior high dance
As friendly as a country club
Necks ticking off my odd points
Eyes scolding me up and down,
I’m molted on the spot.
Their tattle all coo-coo's and poo-poo's
A quibbling over yesterday's lunch
I'd rather be plucked than join in.
But when I hear your strain
From across Pigeon Alley,
I forget all about Audobon's canon.
You could be a goldfinch
I, a blue-footed booby
Still, I would flock to you
Faster than airwaves
Because on the inside—
Where no birdwatcher can go—
On the inside
Our feathers match perfectly.

Florida Vacation

by Jen Hunt, from the archives

Coy winter plays at summer
As the breeze grazes my temples
But her chill betrays
The true season

The sun lifts her head from her pillow
The sun props herself up with her hands

Arching her back
She stretches
One arm
Then another—
Exhales her breathy rays above the hills

My spirit slinks down
Distilled by glow
Refined by shadow
We are at rest
The sun and I

Snow Day

Cozy, cozy
Cozy, dozy
Cozy, cozy
Snowy day.
I'll stay tucked in
From toes to nose
From now
Until late May.

Just in Case

by Jen Hunt, from the archives

If my clock radio turns 12:01
on day one of the new year
I vow to chuck this roll of yellowed gauze
in donut-shaped tin
tucked in a teapot together with the remains
of my dead grandmother’s
medicine chest

I have moved it
from New Jersey to Dallas
all the way through middle America
and down into my in-laws’ basement up
in Outagamie County, Wisconsin
four times in all

I have made room for this tin
where there was none
in closets of one bedroom student apartments
when three of us occupied
a four computer, five bookshelf, no TV, one car,
graduate-student submarine
When you live with a crib
in your kitchen, you think
about downsizing
a
lot

In my mind I have
rearranged, released, discarded
this canister a thousand times

Somewhere a purse-lipped docent
at the Historical American Toiletry Museum
is waiting to put a check by “Ordinary Gauze Tin” on her preservation list

If the world does not collapse tomorrow
she can find mine in the dumpster on January 2
Until then, I’m holding on,
just in case

Remains of the Day, Selcuk

I walk on dust and ashes

Of men honored long before

I stand on ruptured temple grounds

That were and are no more

I follow shafts of plumbing

Trading trails and haunts of old

Mull on tales of babes, and elders--

Strains on progress--sewered out

Beneath each step on silt-veiled mound

Beneath the loam I tread

Call once-conceited carvers

With a deep and utter dread

“Our kingdoms are no longer

Yours is but a blink

Only that which Christ is shaping

Will never topple nor sink”

The TSI Rap by Jen Hunt

I’ve been writing papers for half of my life

And writing one more would bring me too much strife

So instead of ‘gurgitating another list

Tonight I am adding a rapping twist

Please strap your seat belts, hold the frowns--

Now presenting…Jen’s Assessment Low-Down!

Say you’ve got a client who’s freakin’ out

With lots of fears to iron out

He’s feeling numb, irate and troubled

And the height he jumps when scared has doubled

Maybe he returned from a tour in Iraq

And hasn’t been normal since he came back

You think “What to do! Could it be??

This dude right here has P-T-S-D??”

Well, don’t you spaz or get your Hanes in a dither

You’ve been around the block from there to hither,

So cut your Web-browsing, breathe deep, go over

And git out your handy dandy Psycho-M folder,

Simply pull the sheet ‘bout two thirds through 

Under “P” for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Tests and You.

Cause to figure out if it the diagnostic shoe fits

You might have to call on your CN728 wits.

Now PTSD isn’t so rare

Many sufferers exist out there

Guys or gals, be they black, tan, or white

Are struggling with this invisible plight

Some, though no Bear Grylls, have lived Man vs. Wild--

Others, like, Harry Potter, were harmed as a child--

Some are stuck reenacting the Life of Pi

Repeating, “It’s just this tiger on a raft-- and I!”

It could be from rape, it could be from battery,

It could be from war, quakes, accidents--it don’t matter-y,

Around ten percent of us, before we die

Will eat from this traumatic-pie.

Thank God there’s a measure of this madness

A test quite good (though it may lack rad-ness)

Published in the state of gators and Disney

A John Briere tool called the Trauma Symptom Invent’ry

With a hundred-plus Q’s, 20 minutes from start to finish 

This self-administered ditty won’t strain the skittish

Likert-type scaled (from “never” to “often”),

It covers the six months right up ‘til you saw ‘em

Standardized for folks from 18 to high eighties

Hey, you can use this one ‘til your clients push daisies!

Validity’s fine, with age and gender grading,

Its T-score design provides ample clinical scales for rating.

Let’s see….

There’s a scale for irritation, impaired self-reference, irksome thinking,

Anxious arousal, depression, severe somatic inklings,

Two scales for sex concerns and one for insecure attachment,

A scale for if they want to rip their head and smash it           

(Alternatively, for those who might blush,

There’s a version that simply skips the sex-stuff).    

Basically, the TSI assesses amount and types of distress-

Your client has encountered (whether recent or long-repressed).

The test correlates well with other trauma gauges,

Just be careful when using it for minority races.

Its reliability mean is fine at .86,

But in terms of adding info others don’t, it’s mixed.

It requires a “level B,” but takes just 20 minutes to score, 

‘Course there’s always grading software, if you hate the chore.

The first TSI came out in ’95

But in 2011 the whole thing was revised.

Why with sleeker scales, validity and wider norm samples

Orders might soon pour right up to ol’ Briere’s ankles!

I guess I should have called this rap the “TSI-2”

Though it’s too late now to change it, ‘cause I’m almost through.

But wait! All this can be yours for a low, low $350

Which includes an unlimited use CD-ROM—can you say nifty?

In conclusion, my dear Psychometric lasses-- and lad,

I will stop before this sounds like some “Seen On TV” ad.

Just please know, if one day you should find these facts relevant

I hope it’s not because you were trampled by an elephant.

Written for a presentation for CN728 Psychometrics and Assessment, Lakeland College, (Fall 2012) by Jen Hunt, a.k.a. jen@goodpressgirl.com. Sources: R. Piedmont. Test Review: The Trauma Symptom Inventory. Retrieved from http://www.theaaceonline.com/tsi.pdf and L. Seligman, L. and L. Reichenberg. (2007). Selecting Effective Treatments: A Comprehensive, Systematic Guide to Treating Mental Disorders, 3^rd edition, San Francisco, John Wiley & Sons.

Like a fly on a computer screen

by Jen Hunt, from the archives

At birth we arrive in the midst of the scene, like a fly on a computer screen, not knowing how we got there or what went on before. It takes years to uncover the history leading up to our arrival. Like amateur archeologists we dig through layers of silt that go yards, even miles, beneath us, where silt has been accumulating for centuries. We look for bones and pottery shards which verify our independent slant on reality. Sometimes we like what we find. Sometimes we don't. But the digging is imperative.
A grandfather and grandmother, divorced when you were two, will seem to you at first like separate trees planted in different forests in eternity past. But then... a portrait here... a yellowed marriage certificate there... and conceptions shift. Suddenly your eyes move down those separate trees to find (no!) a single burled and knotted trunk. So you discover again or maybe for the first time we are born into a world of aging, hurtful people, who's quarter of phone time is nearly spent who sense they won't be able to say it all before the line dies.
A buttermilk marriage sat souring for thirty-five years before being spit out. Two generations behind me a fortress gate thundered shut while I sat laughing on a pony-ride lap. Silt muffled, then buried, the thunder. I arrived on the site thinking all is well, all is well.
Until I was handed a shovel.