Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, poem, poetry, proof, surrender on May 2, 2017| Leave a Comment »
Beside the highway,
the willows are beginning
to find their green
and the dandelions
have begun to spell
their golden praise
across the ground.
What more did I think
I needed today?
Some proof that things
do not fall apart?
Let me surrender
to beauty, brief
as it is, the melody
that plays beneath
all other melodies.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged ancestral puebloans, beauty, jewelry, poem, poetry, quiet nights on April 28, 2017| Leave a Comment »
In the glass case
is a necklace
with 5,000 stone beads
all drilled and strung
over a thousand years ago
and I think of the man
whose hands did the work—
how he chose not just
to survive, but to make
something beautiful.
I think of your hands,
of the choices
they make,
quiet nights,
all around us,
so much beauty.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, hiking, mountain, poem, poetry, snow on March 29, 2017| Leave a Comment »
After the first half mile
my shoes are soaked through
from post holing through knee deep snow.
There’s still a long way to go,
and the hike is for pleasure, after all,
so I decide it’s not so bad,
the squish of my socks,
the chill seeping in.
It’s just another way to remember
I’m alive, and though it’s slippery
and slushy, the trail,
and though I’m less nimble
than I’d wish to be,
look at that blue, blue sky,
and oh, my long shadow,
see how eagerly it leans to the east.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, great blue heron, poem, poetry, practice on March 26, 2017| 2 Comments »
Remember, says my friend, to look
for beauty every day. And immediately
I think of the blue heron I saw this afternoon
as it flew upriver, its elegant neck tucked
into its body in flight, its deep, slow wing beats
guiding it through the curves of the wide canyon.
In my chest, I felt it, the rising urge to fly,
the pulsing, the thrill of blue heron.
In that instant, I did not wonder
if a moment of beauty is enough
to sustain us through difficult times.
I knew only that I had to remind my eyes
to watch the highway instead of following
the great blue weight as it wove
through the empty cottonwood tops,
its silhouette charged with improbable grace,
its long legs dangling behind,
a reminder we all must land sometime.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, community, poem, poetry, rainbow, timing on March 25, 2017| 1 Comment »
Come quick, said the math teacher,
grabbing me and my daughter by the hand
and rushing us past the school’s edifice
where he pointed east at rainbow
made of ice crystals hung in the air—
an ice rainbow! he exclaimed—
and we applauded with our eyes
until all three of us ran back into the shadows
to pull others to street corner,
sharing in the thrill that we did not
arrive too early, too late,
our breath coming out in misty curls,
silent, visible prayers.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, poem, poetry, time on February 16, 2017| 1 Comment »
these longer days,
still not enough time
to notice how beautiful
the cottonwood
rimed in white
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, fear, poem, poetry, self talk on January 27, 2017| 9 Comments »
Even after I turn off the radio
there is a red voice below my gut
that repeats, “You should be very afraid.”
Out the passenger window
I see three elk bedded down
in the snow beneath a spruce,
and then I am past them,
looking up valley at the mountains
where the wind blows the snow
in long white curls off the peaks.
I want to return, I think,
to a different chapter—
but I don’t believe it.
There are no fewer opportunities
now to fall in love,
and there are a whole lot more
chances to be of service.
I tell myself I was born
for exactly this life—
born to see the frosted cottonwood trees
on the valley floor
flood with the low light of morning,
born to meet the fear in my gut
and carry it with me to do brave and beautiful things.
