I didn’t know how trapped I was
in my own busyness until,
walking past a quiet lake
and up through a lush spruce forest
I felt how with each step toward tree line
more calendar squares disappeared
and all my lists dissolved until
I was nowhere but wading
through waist-high bluebells
with corn lilies rising above my head.
How still my mind was then, still,
as I traversed creeks and clambered
over fallen trees. Still as I climbed
to the place where the clear water
streams down gray cliffs and yellow
monkey flower flourishes on the banks.
I was bathed with gratefulness.
Is it true that to know this freedom
once is to be able to carry it
like a touchstone in my body?
Will the larkspur have any dominion
tomorrow while I’m trapped in a deadline?
Will the scent of summer’s last wild roses
return when I’m scrambling
for just ten more minutes?
Oh freedom, I long to contain you.
That thought makes me laugh.
Yet it’s true. I long to find myself
mid-hustle still linked to the gurgling stream,
its waters so cold I can’t help but gasp.
Archive for July, 2024
Why I Should Hike Every Day No Matter What
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged freedom, hiking, mountain, paradox, stream on July 21, 2024| 10 Comments »
Impossible Task
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged stillness, tree on July 21, 2024| 8 Comments »
For two hours this morning
I practiced being a tree.
Sat in one place in the sun
and did not move. Offered
shade to ground below.
Did not speak. Did not plan.
And though no bird chose
to nest in my lap, was not
averse to such nesting.
Imagined eating light.
To anyone else, it looked
like a woman sitting on
a wooden chair. Need
to keep practicing before
even coming close to
the proficiency of that
spindly crooked spruce
over there.
Because It’s Hard to Not Know
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged connection, friendship, love, ocean, support on July 20, 2024| 8 Comments »
for P
All day I imagine my love
is a great ocean that lifts you
on a warm and gentle tide
so all you need to do today
is float. Float and let yourself
be carried. Float and know
that in this hour nothing
need be done. Perhaps
if you are still today, even
for a moment, you can feel
the way these distant waves
are near as your own sweet breath.
The weight of all that scares you
doesn’t change. I know. I imagine
I lift that, too. Lift it all until
you are certain no matter
how much things change,
you are not alone.
The Changing View
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged change, husband, love, marriage, river on July 18, 2024| 4 Comments »
He walks along the river’s edge,
boots up to his knees, pitchfork
balanced on his shoulder,
his handwoven bucket hat
balanced on his head. And
I fall in love again. Not with
the man I married, but with
the man he’s become—
the man who has pruned
the coyote willows for days,
for years, so we can see
the river as it changes from clear
to bright red from the storms.
Watch as it runs clear again.
Amen
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged fear, gratefulness, holy, paradox, praise, sonnet on July 17, 2024| 8 Comments »
When I forget that the whole world
is holy, even the tiny dark bugs
that slip through window screens
and flock and stick to kitchen lights,
even the charred black remains of forest,
even the river as it floods bright red,
even when my cheeks are tear-stained
and my body tightens with fear,
that is when a kind letter from a stranger
arrives in the mail, or the rabbit will stand
on his back legs to nibble on mint,
or the meadow will blaze with the day’s
last slant of sunlight and my heart opens
so wide that inside the fear rises praise.
Where We’re From
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged belonging, Colorado, home, landscape, natural world, wisconsin on July 16, 2024| 8 Comments »
Though I love this high desert,
I am a lake walking amidst
the cactus and the pinyon pine.
I am sunsets on flat water
and waves in the spring.
I bring my white trillium soul
to the arroyo and let dry sand
run through my fingers.
They never leave me,
these Wisconsin summers,
even though I left them when
I was a barefoot girl,
even though I’ve made a home
amongst red rock cliffs and empty
river beds where the gray trunks
of juniper twist in deep curves
and red-tailed hawks spiral
making visible the wind.
How surprising it is to discover now
in my silvering years some new
insight into what it means to belong:
how sometimes we choose,
how sometimes we are chosen.
One Stitch in Time
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged eternity, time on July 15, 2024| 9 Comments »
it fits too tight
said eternity
to Tuesday
The Day Before Your Sixteenth Birthday
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birthday, daughter, love, mother, story on July 14, 2024| 7 Comments »
We float side by side on the pond for an hour—
you in a tube, me on a paddleboard,
both of us deep in our books.
But even immersed in another world,
I slip more deeply in love with this one
in which I’m your mother and you
my girl and our stories are woven
so closely together that even before
I flip the page of tomorrow, I know
for certain I will love you even more.
Love, Like Math
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged love, math, wave on July 14, 2024| 4 Comments »
People think it’s a moment of Eureka!
But it’s more like a wave,
said the mathematician,
and though he was speaking
of inventing new math,
I thought of discovering new love,
a wave of startling amplitude,
the thrill of energy passing through,
a trough of fear and a crest
of yes. A whole lotta blue.
I don’t remember much
of physics, but I recall
the surge, the crash,
the holding my breath.
I remember the certainty
I would drown, the equal terror
of finding myself on dry land.
It’s not just a flash of insight, he said.
I thought of how long I’ve been
solving for love.
Yeah, I said. I understand.
Letter to the Dead
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged compassion, river, self-compassion, softening on July 13, 2024| 10 Comments »
How many times did I stand
on the shore with you and throw rocks
in this same river simply for the joy
of hearing them splash?
But today, my friend’s daughter
suggested we use sticks
to write invisible wishes on the rocks,
then kiss the stones before we tossed
them in. Perhaps you could guess
what I wished for. Aren’t I always
longing for peace in this world?
But there is so much of me
now you do not know.
Like how today, when I got
behind the car going twenty-seven
miles under the speed limit,
I didn’t call him an idiot.
I just went slower. See?
Things change. Even this woman
who is still throwing rocks
in the same river.
Only now the splash
makes me both laugh and cry.
And now, when I drive
behind a slow, slow person,
I can’t not think
of what wishes
they might write.