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Fact Checking

January 27, 2026 by Rosemerry


 
 
When a gator is chasing you,
he said, you run away,
but zig zag. They can scent you,
and they’re fast, but they aren’t
agile enough to turn well. And
this is how I might have become
a gator bite. His advice sounded good,
and it was echoed by others I met,
but fact is the best bet to survive
a gator attack is to back up slow
with the hands in the air to look big.
If it charges, then run. Fast.
In a straight line. No zagging.
They’re quick, but tire easily on land.
How many other stories do I trust
every day, not thinking to look them up?
How many people have I fed to the gators?
The world has never been swampier.
The need to check what we’re told is great.
Look friend, here comes a gator even now.
Face him. Raise your arms. Back away slow.
Don’t turn your back if you can help it.
They look more like people than you’d think.
 
 

—Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

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In Broad Daylight

January 26, 2026 by Rosemerry


 
 
I take my rage to the river.
A heron flies into the wind.
I let myself be opened
by the great gray wings
and the great gray sky
and the great gray largeness of water,
not to rid myself of rage
but to become a clearer channel
to meet the chest-scouring,
scab-clawing, cell-screaming,
throat-burning fury of rage
and remind my heart I can
know all this rage, can be
feral with rage and still
keep on loving the world.

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One Inward

January 24, 2026 by Rosemerry


 
 
only when buffeted
by the windstorm do I truly notice
how still I can be

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With My Open Heart as Bait

January 23, 2026 by Rosemerry


 
 
What are you catching today?
I asked the man on the pier.
Nothin’, he said.
What do you wish you were catching?
I asked.
Anything, he said.
And could I be so brave?
Could I throw out my line
to the ocean of the world,
stand there at the edge,
patient and still,
and say to life, anything,
anything at all, whatever you give me,
I’ll reel it in. I’ll take it.

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A Great Shining

January 23, 2026 by Rosemerry

 

                  inspired by Maya Stein’s 10-line poem form
 
 
What if, in this moment, every person on earth thinks of someone who makes us feel cherished, known, safe? What if we let ourselves linger in this moment of connection? What might happen inside each body? What might happen in the world as in unison our breaths begin to even and slow? Would the pulsing of our hearts begin to synch, the way heart cells in a petri dish come to keep time with each other? What is earth if not a great experiment in which we are all both observer and observed? How long could it last, this rhythmic communion between jailor and prisoner, oppressor and oppressed, between fighter and fighter, maker and destroyer, parent and child, liar and believer, all of us thinking of love? Foolish, perhaps, to imagine such impossible moments. But more foolish not to imagine such things. Even now, I’m thinking of someone. It feels like the moon is inside me.

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One Reflexive

January 21, 2026 by Rosemerry

the way the pupil knows
to widen in the dark
in these darkening days, this heart

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The Channeling

January 20, 2026 by Rosemerry


 
We might as well be divine.
                  —Kate Horowitz, “i tell the ghost of carrie fisher the world is ending”
 
 
We might as well be divine.
As masked agents arrive
with guns, curses
and brutal disrespect,
we might as well be divine.
We might as well sing at the edge
of collapse, bring forth the kind
of harmony that calls goosebumps
to arms and hot tears to eyes.
As we march, as we gather,
as we fight for each other,
we might as well be divine.
As rivers shrink and sinkholes
appear and we face water
bankruptcy worldwide,
we might as well share
what is not ours to own.  
And be kind to each other.
And praise what good we find.
This is it. It’s like this. Nothing
but now. What we bring,
who we are, this is all.
As tears fall fast and voices rise,
as fear grows thick and viscous,
we might as well be channels for grace,
we might as well be divine.

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 Late Night Flight

January 20, 2026 by Rosemerry


 
 
Expecting my daughter to come in
late, I slept lightly, attentive
to the slightest sound.
Imagine my surprise when my son,
dead four years, came into my room
and spoke soft in my ear
to let me know he was home.
I hugged him so long. Wondered
aloud why I hadn’t been expecting him.
Let him know his sister had
taken over their old room. Together,
we sorted through his old art projects,
old shirts, old shoes. When his sister
came home we hugged her, too,
and played chase, leaping over the bed,
the chairs, laughing, squealing, alive.
Soon, I was floating—zagging
through the air with wild delight—
not because I was trying to fly, more
like I was a leaf lifted by wind, soaring
with no effort of my own. I chased them
this way, through the dream to the day,
and our laughter was then and now
and somehow inside me forever.

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Four Chances to Play Poetry Online

January 20, 2026 by Rosemerry

The Art of Truly Seeing: Rilke & Rodin
January 28, Feb. 4, Feb 11. 11 a.m.-1 p.m. mountain time
with cultural historian Kayleen Asbo
recorded
 
 
A Meditation and Poetry Retreat for Challenging Times
February 7 & 8,  10 a.m. – 4:30 p.m mountain time both days
With eco-dharma teacher Susie Harrington 
not recorded
 
 
Thresholds and Doorways: Writing into Life’s Inevitable Transitions
Feb. 26 & 27, 9 a.m.- 3 p.m. and 9 a.m.-noon mountain time
With Circles of Trust facilitator Marcia Eames-Sheavly,
hosted by Center for Courage and Renewal
not recorded
 
 
Writing for Refuge: An Online Poetry Retreat with James Crews
March 10, 17, 24, 31, 10-noon mountain time
recorded

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Dear Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.

January 19, 2026 by Rosemerry


 
                  with language from the March on Washington Speech and the Letter from Birmingham Jail
 
Again we must learn how the destiny
of one citizen is the destiny of all.
We must learn we cannot walk alone.
The American dream of liberty
and justice for all is tarnished and torn
in the name of making our country great.
Where is our beacon? How many
deaths will it take? How much horror?
How much ache? Where is our dignity?
Where is our discipline? Where does
the dream still live? Is it in the icy streets
of Minnesota? In detention cells?
In the bare feet of the monks walking
our highways? In the hand-painted
protest signs all across America
proclaiming “We the People?”
Is the dream still alive in the gaps left
in government documents where words
have been banned, words such as “diversity,
woman, Native American, disparity,
inclusiveness, Black, equality, Hispanic,
oppression, community and immigrants?”
Is the dream in red blood in the snow?
In dried blood on the street? In voting booths?
In hope? Dr. King, you taught us we need not
be saints to make a difference. That like you,
we must show up frustrated and flawed as we are.
That freedom “must be demanded
by the oppressed.” Where is the dream?
Where does it live? How might it rise up
in our streets, recalibrate our minds,
and resonate like an anthem
ringing true in our chests?

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