Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cello, losing the self, loss, music, poem, Rostropovich on June 30, 2012| 2 Comments »
It is Bach
I tell the broccoli
knife keeps quarter beats
*
all my empty spaces
alive with cello and silence—
every loss
has made it possible
this breathtaking resonance
*
the music touches
me everywhere, everywhere
purple gladiolas
*
in the kitchen
I am being spun, whirling
the cello bows
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged attention, circling, freedom, losing the self, poem, poetry, sound on June 29, 2012| 5 Comments »
So busy watching my feet
move over the small stones,
dried leaves, paths of ants,
it is a long time before
I see the birds.
*
What is it I am circling?
What is this longing
to name it?
*
The slats of shadow
and light only look
like prisons.
We slide through the bars
like song.
*
The bell does not ring
when we call it bell. It rings
with the playing of it.
*
And what is playing me,
this too-solid bell of a
flesh called woman,
Hollow me, I am
diligently practicing
my one note
in the symphony.
*
All these obstacles,
and still
the unspiraling line.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged acceptance, forgiveness, poem on June 28, 2012| 3 Comments »
It never looks like we think it will.
I imagine flowers, of course,
or an open field, or a single plum
in the center of a bowl.
But today, forgiveness is a scrap of net,
mostly hole, with frayed ends
and matted with white paint.
It has no apparent use.
It holds nothing, it comes
with no instructions.
I had thought it would serve me.
I had thought it would make me
feel better or get me further along
than where I was. I thought
I could make it happen.
And here is forgiveness,
a featherweight shred,
something I might have overlooked
if it hadn’t been placed
in my hands.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged parenting, poem, walking, wits end on June 27, 2012| 4 Comments »
That was the day
that she stopped the car
at the edge of the highway,
opened the door,
got out and began to walk.
Past the ditch full of cattails
and blue plastic bags,
past the yellow mail box,
past the house with the royal blue roof,
past the dead cat,
past the empty cardboard box,
she did not look back,
past the man digging in his field
who remarked it was too hot
to walk, and she nodded and
kept on walking.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged armageddon, beauty, dragonfly, haiku, mess, moon, space, story, surprise on June 27, 2012| 2 Comments »
balanced on a twig—
two blue dragonflies and
all that space between them
*
the story, calloused
and gnarled, inside it
red leaping blood
*
picking up the moon
like a telephone to dial
your number, of course
*
contemplating
dessert for
the Armageddon
*
opening a can
of worms to find
rose petals
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bug, darkness, infinity, insect, light, not knowing, poem on June 26, 2012| 2 Comments »
We remark those bugs
that hurl themselves
toward the light
and perhaps, because
we too are focused there,
we miss all those insects
that rocket themselves
deeper and deeper
quiet, as fast as they can
into the infinite dark.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged acceptance, body, bow, humanness, humility, poem, practice, suffering on June 26, 2012| 3 Comments »
I bow to the ache of it,
the deep inner eating
away at itself, I bow
to the shivers, the gooseflesh,
the waves of nausea and pain.
I bow to the unnamed,
to question, to dark.
And I bow to the fear
that swells in small spaces
and the vast quiet
that dissipates the fear.
I bow to every other human
who hurts and I bow
to the yellow flowers tonight
blooming in the muck
where the river used to be.
I bow to the ache, goddammit,
I bow to it and I bow
to the reluctance to bow to it,
bow to the longing to shove
it all away, and I bow,
hush now, just bow.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged freedom, knot, loss of self, love, not knowing, poem, poetry, rope on June 23, 2012| 6 Comments »
This rope of love
I tied in knots
without knowing
how to untie them.
Knot after knot,
I tied a net
for catching
myself, all the while
longing for freedom.
Why do we play
such games—
one hand open
in prayer, begging
for one thing,
the other hand working
as fast as it can
for the opposite.
You know the old
magician’s trick
when he produces
from his pocket
a knotted rope,
mumbles some magic,
and with his words
all the knots fall out.
Ta da! Well, it was not fast like that,
but slowly and quietly
and one by one
with both hands
open and by some
miracle all the knots came
undone and I
am falling, falling
through the threads
I thought would save me,
falling into the stark
between the stars,
falling through
the fragrance of laughter
and the silence
after that.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged carnival, gardening, haiku, nostalgia, poem on June 22, 2012| 3 Comments »
spinning on the tilt-a-whirl
scent of tomato leaves
still on my hands
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged arguing, mothering, separation, tall poppies, tanka on June 22, 2012| 3 Comments »
he pushes and he
pushes and he pushes and
he pushes and I
push back and we both topple
tall poppies hacked at the stem
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, butterfly, freedom, imprisonment, mothering, parenting, poem, poetry on June 21, 2012| 3 Comments »
Finn comes in, hands cupped
and asks me for a jar. What for?
I ask, and he lets me peek between
his palms to see the butterfly.
He is all aglow with the catching of it,
and I do not try to hide my regret.
Let it go, I say, it will be so much happier, love.
No, he shouts, and looks about
for a jar since I won’t help him out.
Please Finn, I say, let it go,
but he is intent on keeping
what is beautiful. He pokes holes
in the lid so the admiral can breathe,
gives it a yellow salsify and insists
that it’s sipping nectar. The butterfly,
all violent wing, flaps a long time before
settling beside the pretty weed.
Finn stares in the jar at his butterfly.
It is pure, his admiration for the
loveliness he sees, so pure that I squeeze him
tight, too tight perhaps, my arms
around the place he would have wings.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged allowing, apricots, denial, loss, poem, poetry, what is on June 20, 2012| 6 Comments »
Perhaps
I thought
by leaning
into loss,
it would become
more comfortable.
But it is like
overripe apricots.
There is no
managing,
no pretending,
no way
to make
it anything
but what
it is.
They are overripe.
Nothing
to be done
about a gift
like that
except to walk
the rows
and gather
the sunwarmed
flesh, bruised
and soft,
and eat it until
you can’t
eat another
sweet bite,
then gather
the fruit
to freeze
until the freezer
will hold no more
and then
when the orchard
floor is still
mottled with
fruit on the edge
of moldering,
know there
is really
nothing
to be done,
and though
it is uncomfortable
stop naming
this experience
loss and
start leaning
into what is,
the only
place
we can
rest.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged known, loss of self, moth, poem, uncertainty, unity on June 18, 2012| 2 Comments »
You are nothing but materials for burning
—Dorothy Walters
I wanted to be
somebody, not
just somebody
but somebody
wonderful and
preferably thin.
I wanted to be
somebody loved
and loving, someone
worth listening to,
someone fun, and
for forty two years
I built her into
a me, but she
is just a heap
of labels, a pile
of shoulds, a
list of pretty knowns
and fueling the one
who wants, there
is the one who is.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cherries, lose the self, love, poem, unity on June 17, 2012| 2 Comments »
When they ask you what you’re thinking of, say love.
–The Avett Brothers
It is messy,
this readying
cherries,
dark skin
resists
to give
up the pit
and the flesh
it drips
and the juice
it stains
and isn’t
this a bit
like love,
my ripe heart
beating
as if
to escape
my own
dark skin.
It is messy
this preparation.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged caffeine, haiku, headache, poem, poetry, withdrawal on June 16, 2012| 3 Comments »
in the head, a clang,
gong, clash and bang, while in the yard
one bird chirps
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged apricots, loss, ripeness, storm, tanka, wind on June 16, 2012| 4 Comments »
ripe apricots
heavy with sweetness
strewn around
the orchard floor this calm
morning after the wind storm
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, butterfly, death, haiku, life on June 15, 2012| 2 Comments »
yellow butterfly
so beautiful, wings spread
so dead
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged anatomy, buddhism, desire, love, poem, poetry, satire, villanelle on June 14, 2012| 4 Comments »
Contemplating the unattractive nature of the body debilitates sensual lust, the first of the five hindrances … By mentally dissecting the body into its organs, tissues and fluids, we see that “the mark of the beautiful” that fuels sensual desire is merely a subjective projection superimposed on a collection of unappealing parts.
—Bhikkhu Bodhi, “The Four Protective Meditations,” Tricycle, Summer 2012
My dear, the Buddhist monk could not have known
when he suggests my mind dissect your parts
how beautiful your lungs, medulla, bones.
Such gold streams through your bile ducts! I’d clone
your pineal gland. Your thymus is fine art.
My dear, the Buddhist monk could not have known
the curve of your amygdale, how toned
your cerebellum, spleen so red so dark,
how beautiful your pancreas, your bones.
I’d make mosaics of your kidney stones
and build an altar for your muscled heart.
My dear, the Buddhist monk could not have known
how all your parts appeal so. I’ve grown
to love your splanchnopleura, liver marks,
your beautiful esophagus, your bones,
your hypothalamus, untamed hormones.
My favorite? Man, I don’t know where to start.
I’m sure that Buddhist monk could not have known
how beautiful your ganglions, your bones.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged dissolution, ego, little me, lose the self, poem, poetry, prayer on June 13, 2012| 9 Comments »
How’s the dissolution going? –Joi Sharp
Flatten me.
Shuck me.
Dissolve
and melt me.
Disperse me
in the air.
Scatter me.
Shatter me.
Fling and
unmatter me.
Shred, slough,
shear, split, tear.
Loose me.
Reduce me.
Erase and
untether the
small self
who compares.
Help me
abandon
any hope
I’ll ever
arrive
somewhere.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged light, poem, poetry, summer, sun, warmth, what cannot be held on June 12, 2012| 2 Comments »
Sometimes midsummer the body
simply refuses to go inside. Though
reason would say to hide from the sun
midday, the body goes out anyway
to the garden, the orchard, the river,
the field and gathers warmth, as if
it could store this wealth of light, as if
one winter night it might from some fold
of pallid skin produce a secret radiant skein,
something fulsomely warm still smack
with peonies and wild mustard scent,
something not bitter and not at all slant
that we might wrap our shivering bodies in,
oh wheeling swallows, oh sun so high.