eavesdropping on my own heart
wishing I could understand the whispers—
rustle of golden leaves
Archive for October, 2016
One Curiosity
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged heart, poem, poetry, uncertainty on October 20, 2016| 1 Comment »
How to Eat the Moon
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged apology, chief of police, moon, poem, poetry on October 20, 2016| 2 Comments »
“We must move forward together to build a shared understanding. We must forge a path that allows us to move beyond our history and identify common solutions to better protect our communities.”
—Terrence Cunningham, president of the International Assn. of Chiefs of Police
With salt, of course,
though there’s the matter of how
to get the salt to stick
without the assist of gravity.
And paired with a slightly chilled sauvignon blank,
preferably from Marlborough, of course,
with its hints of green pepper and grass.
It doesn’t taste like cheese after all,
but then the experts never seem to be right.
It tastes more like, well, hard to say.
Try another bite.
You never thought you’d be here, did you,
sampling these bits of reflected light.
Almost as unexpected as the apology
earlier tonight from the man in the suit
so blue it looked black.
Maybe not a white. A red.
A cab. Dark fruit. Full body.
One that’s needed time to evolve.
Its complex woody tones compliment
the moon’s impressive density.
What was it he said? “While
we obviously cannot change
the past, it is clear that we
must change the future.”
Toast to the future
and raise your glass
and take another nibble of moon.
Notice how dark it is, really,
about the color of asphalt, worn down.
It’s only because space itself is so dark
that the moon seems comparatively light.
All along you thought it was white.
Where else have you been wrong?
Perhaps between sips
and forkfuls you’ll find an apology
ripening there on your own startled tongue.
At the moment, anything seems possible.
The night makes its rounds.
One Unsequencing
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged answer, poem, poetry, question on October 19, 2016| Leave a Comment »
One Rattling
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged poem, poetry, wonder on October 16, 2016| 3 Comments »
Over the Edge
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged dragon, fear, parenting, poem, poetry, unknown on October 16, 2016| 4 Comments »
hic sunt dracones
it says on the Hunt-Lennox globe,
its copper halves wired together.
The words mark
the eastern coat of Asia.
Here are dragons.
Half a century later,
we wonder still
did the maker mean
Komodo dragons?
Sea monsters?
The Dagroian people
whom Marco Polo reported
would eat the dead
and lick their bones?
Or was it simply a nod
to how frightening
it feels at the edge
of the known?
Tonight my son calls me
with an unbearable ache,
his map of the world
torn.
Though I am far away,
or perhaps because of that,
we are close.
Our voices say the words
we least want to say.
Our hearts are porous
and soft.
I want to tell him
that the dragons are not
at the edge of the map.
They are inside us.
And sometimes
they are more evil
than the most evil
we could imagine.
And sometimes,
though we’d rather
hate them, they are beautiful.
Instead I tell him
these are difficult times.
The globe, the third oldest
terrestrial globe in the world,
about the size of a grapefruit,
was bought by an architect
named Hunt. He told his friend
he had bought the object
in Paris for a song.
He let his children toy with it.
The friend begged
Hunt to keep the globe safe.
None of us are safe.
I fear I have let my dragons
escape, that they have flown
into my son.
Let him toy with them then,
the old ways of thinking
about the world—
let the unknown
become a place for play.
Here are dragons,
I think, as I redraw
the map, and write
the words on my face.
They sprout wings
and pick me up
with their terrible claws
and fly me to the cliffs
of my life
and drop me
over the edge.
One Stumble
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged hiking, love, poem, poetry, trail on October 15, 2016| 1 Comment »
If You Can’t Make it to the Gallery …
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Art, ekphrastic poetry, Gallery 81435, Jill Sabella, poem, poetry, Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer on October 14, 2016| Leave a Comment »
then you can enjoy the show right here on your screen. Last week was the opening of In Three Lines, a collaboration in art and poetry, at Gallery 81435 in Telluride.
I recommend listening to cello while you look through these images … that is what we had playing in the gallery, and the rich and resonant tone of the instrument seemed the perfect partner to these intimate and provocative pieces.
Here is a link to the pieces that are still available for sale, and if you look around the site, you will find that you can see the whole show. Thanks to the gallery for putting together this virtual tour.
The show is done in partnership with Snowmass artist Jill Sabella. For two years, we have been corresponding to create this comprehensive body of work. We took turns sending each other three-line inspirations. The pieces in white came first, and the pieces in beige were responses.
You can purchase books at wordwoman.com. And for more information about the artist, visit her website here. 
One Altar
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged mean girl, poem, poetry, splinter on October 13, 2016| 2 Comments »
that splinter in my finger,
touching it again
to feel the small ache sing—
she is made of splinters
still learning not to walk too close
Phylogenetic
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birds, classification, poem, poetry, questions on October 12, 2016| 1 Comment »
Just today my son asked
if birds were mammals.
No, I said, without looking up.
Then are they reptiles, he said,
and I thought no, but then
I thought maybe, and then I said,
I don’t know. Turns out some
classify yes and others say no.
There are so many ways
to see the world.
I think of scaly feet and believe
the crocodile and heron
could be cousins.
I think of intersections.
It’s not a surprise
humans arrive at different answers,
what surprises me is how
there are questions I no longer ask.
Like the nature of a bird.
Like the nature of love.
How many other questions
are gathering dust or are waiting
to be found?
Framed
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged future, line, personal responsibility, poem, poetry on October 12, 2016| 1 Comment »
Here is the future,
a line to be crossed.
Someone has tied it
into a noose
with a loop wide enough
it will fit over all of our heads.
Sometimes at night
do you feel its heat
against your neck,
a burning you can’t explain?
Tell yourself the only
difference between a noose
and a lifeline is the way
you tie the knot.
Here, here are your hands,
persistent and willing,
able to loosen, refashion,
forgive. And here is tomorrow,
a line with your name
written on it.