I had not known
to call the rabbit brush
chamisa. I wonder now how
this might have changed things,
knowing how the right name
can sometimes soften a woman.
It would be harder to say the word as a curse,
chamisa, chamisa. Today it is easy to enjoy
the way it hums in the center,
then slips off the lips at the end.
And could the tall, fragrant brush have
slipped like those syllables through my
weeding hands? All those years of ripping it up.
I laugh about it now, how I thought I needed an enemy.
And why? Some sense of hierarchy?
Some sense of control?
You are right to notice how I have built
a new kind of shrine, how sadness has
done what sadness does, made me
more open to praising how many shades of gray
are at play in a single moment. It is easier to see them
when I am not so distracted by gold and by blue.
But I have no need to weed out the sadness
as I surely tried to years ago. Perhaps
because I gave it a softer name. Surrender.
Surrender. It rolls around in the back of the mouth
before I swallow the sound. It is beautiful growing
out there in the field where before I only
could tolerate bright mounds of happinesses.
I smile that you say I am still building. I like to say
that I am unbuilding whatever it is I think I know.
But that, of course, is just a new way of knowing,
a new way of building. I had to sleep with the words before I knew
how true they were. Fortress or cathedral, you say.
I say, sometimes I hang up a welcome sign
and then, quickly, quietly, close the iron gate.
I would like to build a church to brokenness,
though perhaps brokenness is just another word
for whole. They are equally lovely to say,
one cracking open in the center,
one chiming with ohm.
Already I have said too much. What I wanted to say
was thank you. For showing me what I could not see.
For the call to listen to my heart. And for this line,
the dignity of consequences. I am learning
to feel the blessings, which is, perhaps,
just a beautiful word for “what is.”
Blessings. Blessings. Among many, you
are one of the easiest to see.
“knowing how the right name
can sometimes soften a woman.”
When I was teaching the young prisoners I asked them their names and they would answer, “xxx” but my uncle calls me “yyy.” And this told me two things: who they really were and who loved them.
We find our name when love arrives.
Love arrives when we name ourself.
Have you read Madeline L’Engle, A Wind in the Door? Your children would love it. It is the second book after A Wrinkle in Time. It is all about the power of naming and love and how they are interwoven.
I love this poem.
And I love making friends with the things I used to want to yank out.
I’m working on two of those just now.
Bind weed being one.
The other has longer roots. 🙂
Smiling at both.
Your poem helps.
what a great response, Rebecca, there is so much in a name. We just read the Wrinkle in time last summer, and we bought Wind in the Door, but I haven’t re-read it with the kids yet. I just recall how much I loved it when I was a girl.
this was the perfect poem for me to read this morning..although it is early I have already thought about these same topics…so much! love you and your words!
I love this poem. although it is early here I have already been thinking about these exact same things. Love you and your words…
Thanks dear Nancy! I love that we are in the same weave of wonderings
R. May I quote you. . .”And for this line,
the dignity of consequences. I am learning
to feel the blessings, which is, perhaps,
just a beautiful word for “what is.”
Thank you for the awakening. Abbraxi. J.
Hi Dear Friend, of course you can quote me, but the first part of that line is a quote from my other dear friend, Frank Coons, who wrote a poem the other day, “Fortress or Cathedral,” that began with the line “I believe in the dignity of consequences.”
The letter form works nicely here, that speaker’s voice addressing the unknown F.C. — at least unknown to this reader. But it transcends that form, especially in sections 2, 4, 6. The dignity of consequences, such a provoking idea for the end of the poem.