These poems
are only words
nesting on a page,
but when you read them
they become
hummingbirds—
can you feel
how they are drawn
to the red flower of you,
how it is you
who gives them
the nectar they need,
how it is
what is inside you
that supports
their tiny
fluttering
hearts?
Archive for March, 2021
Symbiosis
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged ars poetica, hummingbird, reader on March 31, 2021| 2 Comments »
Forty Years Later
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cruelty, kids, self doubt, thistle, weeds on March 31, 2021| 4 Comments »
Sticks and stones may break my bones
but words plant thousands of tiny malicious seeds
that remain viable for a hundred years,
seeds that spring up in any season,
pushing their basal rosettes
through the rocky soil of self-doubt.
I suspect you don’t even remember casting
the seeds, but I have weeded them
from me for decades, tugged at them,
cursed when the tap roots snap
and the thorned stems of those old words
come back twice as strong.
Sometimes now, there are seasons
when none of your seeds come up.
Sometimes, on purpose, I let them grow and bloom,
surprised that out of something cruel
something beautiful still manages to thrive.
Sometimes those prickly bouquets
help me remember who I’m not, who I am.
Thank You
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged aesop, ars poetica, crow, fable, friendship, save on March 30, 2021| 4 Comments »
for all poetry friends
I am perhaps the crow
who, parched, unable to fly,
arrives at the pitcher
and realizes
I cannot reach the water.
But in this story,
there are no pebbles nearby.
In this story,
there are other crows
who arrive, each
with pebbles they drop
into the pitcher.
You, my friends,
are the crows.
Your words
are the pebbles.
And slowly, sweet miracle,
the water rises.
Two Poems Today in ONE ART!
Posted in Uncategorized on March 29, 2021| Leave a Comment »
I love receiving the ONE ART poetry journal almost every day in my inbox … and today it’s my delight to be featured there with two poems!
Faced with an Impossibility
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged encouragement, inner struggle, spaciousness on March 28, 2021| Leave a Comment »
When at last I feel solid again,
along come the mysterious tools
that carve in me
a new spaciousness.
Such painful excavation,
and yet somehow
inside this human shape,
I contain a grand canyon
deep enough for high risk;
a wrestling arena vast enough
for wings of angels
and storming demons of doubt;
and an entire concert hall
with acoustics so fine
that when the smallest voice
in me sits on stage and whispers
you can do it,
I can hear it clearly,
even in the cheap seats,
and though the song is tiny,
it’s so resonant
I sing along.
No, I Did Not Lose Track of Time
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged time, train on March 27, 2021| Leave a Comment »
I am all too aware of that permanent track
with its strict rails of duty and ties of to do,
how it structures my days
in inflexible ways, allows the engine
of time to move only on pre-regulated paths.
I would love to lose those tracks of time,
veer off the underlying subgrade
and stroll on foot through the fields of hours
and lay in the lazy tall grass of warm days.
Or so I say. And yet I commit
to new rails, new track that I pound in
with the iron spikes of yes,
like a pioneer hellbent on progress.
No. I did not lose track of time,
but perhaps I lost track of me.
Perhaps I lost track of you.
Perhaps it is not too late.
In Orbit
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged aloneness, earth, prayer, space, violence on March 26, 2021| 6 Comments »
Count the one beautiful blue and green planet.
Count it again.
Say “home,” then marvel at the taste of tears.
Notice how no borders matter from here.
Remember how important they feel
when standing on a border. Once
you dreamt of being alone. Of being
far away from parking lots and grocery store lines
and men with guns and violent conviction.
Now you dream of touching someone else,
of breathing in the scent of garden dirt,
of hearing a voice without static, of lying down
in a bed, held by your own sweet gravity.
What you would do to taste a tree-ripened peach.
Give up on counting stars. Draw lines between them,
creating your own constellations:
The open hand. The river gorge. The crooked evergreen.
A semi-automatic rifle, which you re-constellate
into a small bouquet of lilies. Consider forgiveness.
Wonder how long it will take before it feels authentic.
Circling has taught you how things come around.
Remember? There was a time you didn’t think
you knew how to pray.
The Day My Son Told Me He Hates Where We Live
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged parenting, place, son, tension on March 26, 2021| 5 Comments »
I try not to take it personally.
The country is not for everyone—
lazy stream and open field
and airy glades of cottonwood.
I walk out in the dead grass
and realize how much I love
the dead grass. How much
I love the red stained willows,
bright squawk of jay and scent of mud
and lack of pavement, lack of horns,
lack of benches and stores and street lamps.
I prefer the bustle of birds at the feeder
to any human throng.
It isn’t wrong for him to love something else,
the heart loves what it loves,
though I long to defend the smooth flat stones,
the hawk that even now circles the field,
the mice making arteries through snow.
I wish he were happy here, says the heart,
unable to reconcile the rift.
Across the river, snow sifts in thin white wisps,
escapes through dark red cliffs.
Belonging
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged belonging, love on March 24, 2021| Leave a Comment »
Forgive me, please, when I,
thrilling in how much I love you,
believe you belong to me—
like a book or shirt or a ring.
Writing that short list,
it now seems strange
I believe I own anything.
I know well the unstitching of loss.
Let me learn to love you loosely
the way I love morning,
the way I love song,
the way I love hawks on the wing.
Let me love you the way
I love poems, startled
and grateful each time I find
it is I who belongs to them.
published in ONE ART: A journal of poetry
After the Tortoise Won the Race
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged fable, fairy tale, good enough, success, tortoise on March 23, 2021| 10 Comments »
It was the strangest thing.
She’d never cared before about winning.
Life had been about basking in the sun
at the entrance to her burrow.
Sometimes when she was warm enough,
she’d plod off in search of leaves.
Now, she thought about finish lines.
The feel of the ribbon on her prehistoric nose.
The roar of the crowd as she crossed.
They say tortoises don’t have feelings,
no hippocampus in their small brains,
but she’d felt it, the thrill of success.
She spent decades looking for another race
she had a chance to win. None of her friends
could understand. Come dig in the sandy soil,
they said, but it wasn’t enough anymore.
She wished she’d never said yes to that race.
She wished she could race the hare again tonight.
She wished she could stop defining her life
by that one moment. Wished she could stop wishing
for any life beyond the life she had now,
sleeping in her burrow, cool and moist.
Wished all she wanted were soft weeds and long-leaf pines.
Wished she could hear that crowd just one more time.
published in ONE ART: A journal of poetry