dried on the bush
these roses
I never picked for you
*
but I have nothing
to sow said the hand
to the plow
*
caught in the web
all those dreams
I gave wings
*
too soon, I said
to the sun, said the sun,
you are the one who moves
Archive for June, 2013
Four What Ifs
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged haiku, poetry, short poem, what if on June 22, 2013| 3 Comments »
Ripe
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged guilt, mulberry, pleasure, poem, poetry, tanka on June 22, 2013| 1 Comment »
purple handed
after mulberry picking—
imagine if
all pleasures
came with stain
To an Old Tune
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged blame, forgiveness, human nature, Norwood, poem on June 21, 2013| 1 Comment »
The wind is cruel
and the heat is cruel
and the drought is pitiless.
It goes on this way.
These are no reasons
to hurt each other.
But we do.
Even the weeds
are blanched and brittle,
the stems dry as pencils,
and it is not yet
the last day of spring.
The fathers go on with their
blaspheming.
The winter was cruel
and the cold was cruel
and the dark was merciless,
it bound us.
Always something
to blame. We could say
the scent of even
a few drops of rain
is generous. We could say
here is my hand.
The Blessing
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged blessing, cottonwoods, dissolution of the separate self, falling in love with the world, poem, poetry, trees on June 20, 2013| 3 Comments »
Sometimes I forget
the trees. It’s embarrassing
to admit. Like saying I forget
I have hands. But
days go by when I do not
consider them. And then
some mornings, today,
for instance, the trees,
like an Indian saint
hurling petals at her attendants,
throw their fluffy white catkins
into my hands, my hair,
into my everywhere I look
until everything is baptized
in white cotton down
and I half expect the giant limbs
to pull me into a great gray trunk
and hold me close, whispering
into my ear, in words so quiet
no one else can hear, my daughter,
my daughter, my daughter, my daughter.
Making the Ask
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged body, breaking open, compassion, heart, love, poem, prayer, service on June 19, 2013| 5 Comments »
Hearts will never be practical until they can be made unbreakable.
—The Wizard of Oz
Give me a heart that breaks,
a heart that longs to open
wider and wider, always revealing
more space. Give me hands
that long to serve. Make them strong
enough to build what must be built.
Make them fall in love with letting go.
Make them unable to hurt. Give me a mind
that leans toward generosity. A tongue
that speaks in only we. Feet that run
toward those in need. Eyes
that see beneath the masks. Ears
that hear the silence
that is the staff for every sound. A nose
that follows the fragrance of truth.
Blood the same red as everyone else’s.
And give me a heart that breaks again
and again, the way ocean waves
break, unpredictable, an endless
breaking, an endless release,
in which nothing is ever really lost,
in which we are found.
One
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged compassion, haiku, love, poem, poetry, tears on June 18, 2013| 2 Comments »
watching you weep
I weep, they are sweet, your tears
in my eyes
The Daughter of the Biologist Supposes
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged biologist, control, daughter, father, pain, poem, poetry on June 17, 2013| 5 Comments »
In the dirt crawl space
under the yellow house
my brother and I
would play among dad’s jars—
dozens of jars
filled with clear greenish liquid,
all of them holding
dead white fish,
their colors
long since faded.
Every black-capped container
was labeled with typewritten
lettering, but we could not yet read.
Mostly we stared
at their clouded scales,
their pale fins,
their useless eyes.
We did not question
why they were there,
stacked beside the winter coats
and boxes of dishes we seldom used.
Dad finally threw them away
when we moved,
though he did not want to let them go.
He cared about those fish in jars.
Not the bodies themselves,
I suppose. Perhaps
because he had been
so alive with the catching
and naming of them.
Perhaps because
there are so many things
that cannot be caught
nor labeled nor set aside.
Like the pain that
even then was beginning
to reach for his joints, grabbing
his shoulders, hips and knees.
Like his father’s anger
that he always carried—
something pale, many scaled,
something vital that died.
Despite all the Right Conditions
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged ars poetica, inspiration, poem, poetry, writer's block on June 16, 2013| 4 Comments »
Some days we can’t find
the poem, at least not
the one we want to write,
the one about purple wisteria,
for instance, or the one
in which the raven appears
a sign that magic is present. Instead
the poem waits to be found
on the back of a paint sample card
or it’s cracked inside a blue glass ball.
You can glimpse it, there!
and it’s beautiful, dewy, but when
you find the pen, the poem
is as missing as the tin man’s heart.
Each time you get close,
it dives into the swimming pool,
though there is no diving allowed.
It tells you there is no happy hour
on Saturdays. It invites you to a dance party,
only you don’t have a car and it is much
too far away to walk.
For a moment, the poem was
a red tailed hawk, but the circles
it made were too high to read.
For a moment, the poem
pulled like turquoise wool
through your fingers, but then
every turquoise stitch you knit
uncounted itself and unraveled.
It is hard not to think it’s something
you’ve done. It is hard not to think
you’ve let yourself down, or even worse,
that you’ve let down the poem.
I’m here, you say, to the air, to the hawk,
to the purple wisteria blooms.
I’m here, you say to the raven, the road runner,
the blue, blue glass of the blue glass ball.
But you’re too in the way, and the more you try
the more it’s like trying to catch a cat that knows
you want to clip its claws.
And the poem slips out of the dragonfly wings
you found on the path this morning,
and it steals the silver from the nightshade leaves
beside the Rio Grande, and it walks out of the room without you.
Even it doesn’t know where it is going.
No Questions Asked
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged poem, poetry, questions on June 15, 2013| 2 Comments »
The gate did not ask
if I needed to find
a way out.
It simply appeared
two steps before
the dead end.
The thorns did not ask
if I wanted to pick
the red flowers.
They just lined every branch
of the leafless bush.
The closed sign
did not ask if I wanted
to enter. The lock
did not care I did not
have a key.
The match did not ask
if I were kindling.
Its red tip disappearing,
your name written
in kerosene
on my heart.
Another Look
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged perspective, poem on June 14, 2013| 1 Comment »
Oh look! says Anita,
pointing to the window,
and there, where only minutes ago
we saw mountains
we now see only gray.
I think of how
I cannot see you.
How many veils
are in the way?
It’s no use
to try to pull them down.
They drop when it is time.
I know where you
are. The mountains, too.
Perhaps I am the one
who is hiding.