No, I didn’t just fall,
I flew. Stubbed my toe
while walking down
the knobby, steep path,
and I flew, did a somersault,
too, and my hat and glasses
fell off, and I landed, sprawling,
somewhat upside down
on the trail and what
is a human to do
but leap up and be grateful
all those big, heavy stones
are in the path and not
in my pockets, grateful
that bruises will heal,
grateful leaping up
was an option this time.
Not that one plans
to fall, but isn’t it strange
how a mistake can
sometimes make you
feel lucky, not lucky
to fall, but lucky to
be able to move
through the world
at all.
Archive for July, 2025
Lucky
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged falling, hiking, luck on July 13, 2025| 2 Comments »
In a Time of Many Wildfires
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged flower, garden, paradox, wildfire on July 11, 2025| 2 Comments »
Geranium leaves
covered in fine white ash—
how many ghosts of tall pine trees
visit today in my garden—
and still, with such delicacy
the new flowers open.
CINEPOEM: For the One Who Is Gone
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cinepoem, Risking Love on July 11, 2025| Leave a Comment »
One more week till the album release of RISKING LOVE! It’s so fun to send out these cinepoems of our tracks each week, featuring poems by me, music by the wonderful Steve Law, and video by the amazing Holiday Mathis. Please join us for our release party next Friday, July 18 on zoom. Free. 3 p.m. Mountain Time. Register HERE. The album itself is sometimes flirty. Sometimes raw. Sometimes electric. Always wildly alive. It’s an intimate album that explores how we might fall more deeply in love with the world as it is, even when that seems impossible. You can listen to this single on Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, or anywhere you listen to music. You can pre-purchase the album on Bandcamp.
You belong to this world with
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged belonging, bluegrass, fire, music, wildfire on July 11, 2025| Leave a Comment »
its early morning thunderstorm
that wakes you with a clap,
this world of early morning rain
and dusty midday paths,
this world with plumes of wildfire
that fill the air by evening,
the valleys thickly choked with smoke,
the mountains disappearing.
You belong to this world of tinder.
Sometimes it hurts to belong.
You belong to the burning world of fear
as much as the world of song.
You most surely belong to music,
to this world of euphoric dancing
And as you dance, you smile,
dance as if it’s your calling.
They sing of constant sorrow.
You dance. The ash keeps falling.
One When I Least Expect It
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged connection, pause, perspective, Wild Rose on July 9, 2025| 1 Comment »
kneeling in front of the wild rose
nose buried in pink petals,
the whole world fitsinto one wild rose
Beyond Patience
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged patience, presence on July 8, 2025| 5 Comments »
If I knew another word for patience,
would it open me to the act?
Perhaps something that invokes the patience
in the zinnias after the first central flower has died
and before the next buds are formed.
Something that speaks to the patience of winter
while the field is greening more deeply every day.
To be patient is to believe there is a moment
beyond now that will be better than now.
So perhaps instead of patience, the word
I’m longing for is presence. The capacity
to be only here. Only now. Here in the garden
where the zinnia row is thick with leaves.
Here in the meadow where it’s warm and
the tall grass tickles my bare thighs. Now
in the week before my sweet girl arrives.
Ah, there it is, back to the anticipation.
Try again. Presence, as in now, in this moment
when swallows swoop and skate and swirl.
Now, when my breath opens in my chest,
opens like a zinnia, many petalled and red.
One Glorious
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, contentment, sunset on July 7, 2025| 1 Comment »
no use sipping this sunset—
I guzzle and immediately
I’m tipsy on pink
Morning
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged dream, grief, loss, sun on July 7, 2025| 6 Comments »
By the time I realized
I was dreaming of him,
it was too late.
Already, the dream
was vanishing like night,
like dew.
For an hour I lay there,
eyes closed, grasping
at glimpses. Losing them.
All I was left with:
He was happy.
So was I.
Finally, I opened my eyes
to this world where
he is not. And yet.
The sun was here warming
the bed. More truly, the sun
was not physically here.
The sun is somewhere
far, far, far away,
but that doesn’t stop it
from transforming
the whole room.
Inner Girl
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged dad, daughter, identity, nickname on July 6, 2025| 9 Comments »
I don’t know why he started calling me Roxanne,
but sometime in high school that’s what Dad did.
No matter it wasn’t my name. I loved how it made
me feel—something just ours. Dad had a way
of doing that—making a person feel seen, feel
uniquely known to him. And so today,
on his birthday, I imagined Dad could see me
through the veils of death. I talked to him as usual
as I weeded the garden bed. Told him about
the four river otter that showed up in the pond today,
how they slid their dark slick bodies across the top
of the water and dined on crawdads for hours.
As always, Dad didn’t talk back. Then, tonight,
at a party, when a woman introduced herself
as Roxanne, I stared at her, stunned, then unraveled
into tears. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I know it’s strange
to have a person start to weep when you tell
them your name.” She was kind to me all
the same. Just hearing someone say the word
I understood how much I miss hearing him
say it, miss the person I am with him.
It’s as if a door has been locked for years—
the door through which I am Roxanne.
Someone silly. Treasured. Supported. Known.
Hearing the name again felt like a key,
a gift on his birthday. It didn’t bring him back,
but it revived a forgotten part of me.
Even now, she is writing this poem.
One on the Fourth of July
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged firework, fourth of july, shooting star on July 4, 2025| 4 Comments »
more special
than a whole sky of fireworks—
one long shooting star
In Harsh Times
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged desert, hope, music, seed, song, transformation on July 4, 2025| 11 Comments »
I know, music alone
will not save us. But tonight
when my daughter played
the song we both love,
we smiled at each other,
all giddy and warm,
and some shriveled
part of me revived.
It was like those seeds
in the desert that wait years
to germinate—all they need
is one good rain.
That’s what a song can do.
Remind us our hope
is merely dormant, not dead.
Who could blame me, then,
for wanting to bring a song
to the whole thirsty world,
a song that soaks into
our parched hearts,
stunning us with just how fast
even the harshest world
can transform.
Into the Questions: Cinepoem from RISKING LOVE
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cinepoem, Risking Love on July 4, 2025| 2 Comments »
I was a little surprised this particular video was scheduled for release on July 4. It wasn’t intentional, just how the date/track release happened to fall. But it feels strangely appropriate. Not celebratory, no, but an earnest query: In a time of othering and blaming when we seem hellbent on hurting each other, it’s time to live into difficult questions. I wrote this poem after listening to a conversation between two men–one in Gaza, the other in Israel. This is the fourth track on RISKING LOVE, a spoken-word album made in collaboration with stunning guitar player Steve Law, and it explores how we might fall more deeply in love with the world as it is, even when that seems impossible. The video is made by the incomparable Holiday Mathis. “Into the Questions” is available for download as a single on Spotify, iTunes, and more. The album releases July 18, 2025, on all platforms and is available for purchase on Band Camp, https://rosemerrywahtolatrommer.bandcamp.com/
Other Video and Audio Releases from Risking Love
Safety Net
The Precious Matter of Love
I Want an Interlude with Mr. Clean
It’s the Fourth of July Again
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged fireworks, fourth of july, grief, stars on July 3, 2025| 6 Comments »
And I didn’t go buy fireworks today.
Not yesterday, either. Nor will
I buy them tomorrow because you
will not be here to light them.
I realize now what I loved about fireworks
was how much you loved them,
the way you brightened when the fuse was first lit,
the way you glowed near incandescent
as the sparks and colors fountained and flashed.
And rapt in your thrill, I would ooh and ahh.
This is how it is. We shape our lives
around the joys of those we love.
You found joy in the bang, the pop,
the squeal, the repeating boom.
I don’t love the noise. Don’t love
the Sulphury smell. Maybe this year,
your dad and I will sit outside
and watch the sparkle of unmoving stars—
this tradition truer to my own sense of joy.
Maybe a meteor will streak the sky.
If it does, I am sure I will ooh and ahh
the way we used to on the Fourth of July,
the way I still do on any given day
because, despite the ache of missing you,
I’m still stunned by this life,
stunned by the things that bring joy in the dark.
Like the candles I burn. Like holding your dad’s hand.
Like the memory of you. Like stars.
Close Encounters
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bunny, grace, grief, rabbit, son on July 1, 2025| 18 Comments »
It was a little mangy, to be honest,
the rabbit in the forest that came close to me—
close enough I could see the way sunlight
made his long ears glow pink. Close enough
for me to coo and praise his remarkably long rabbit feet,
praise the white socks of his fur,
praise the bright brown of his eyes.
Even his patchy, uneven molting couldn’t stop me
from falling in love with the way he leapt
from fallen trunks into patches of bluebells.
We were all staring at him, all six of us,
wondering why he would come so close,
but I took his appearance personally—
like when we read a fortune cookie fortune
and believe there was a bit of our destiny in it.
I cannot see a bunny without believing it’s my son.
I know. It isn’t my son. I also know it is.
Every bunny reminds me he was here.
Every bunny is a chance to push past
my rational mind and fling open the doors
of love. Every bunny, especially this one who
comes so close, seems to say, Sweetheart,
don’t you believe in grace? And as the bunny
leaps from log to duff, I think, I do, I do, I do.