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Posts Tagged ‘birthday’


In the woods, in the dark
we stood amidst old gravestones,
their engravings mostly scrubbed by time.
And Jon played gong,
Robin played chimes
and Evie played bass recorder.
And Owl read of the wood,
Melissa spoke of good life
and I hummed and played the breath.
We spoke the names
of our beloveds who have left.
Some names were spoken
only in silence.
The half-moon joined our circle,
as if it, too, knew something
of loss. As if it were showing us
that sometimes what appears to be gone
is simply unseen.
We walked home in that half light.

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Though she has been shaped
by pain, she thrives.
She is like a tree, now,
that remembers its wounds
and grows differently
because of its injuries,
some of them deep,
yet is no less vigorous
as it grows new healthy wood,
as it reaches for sun,
as it grounds into the soil,
as it offers its fruit
to the world.

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I don’t sing Happy Birthday tonight
when I light the candle,
but I say his name and celebrate
the life of the man born this day
seventy-eight years ago in Joliet, Illinois,
the man who brought ingenuity,
courage and silliness to the world,
the man who told my mother everyday
she was beautiful, the man who
believed in hiring people more talented than he,
the man who flew home to be at my concerts,
the man who drove me to piano lessons,
the man who wept when I moved away.
My own life is a celebration of his life—
he lives inside every word, every action,
every patience, every plan.
Every day since his death, I light a candle.
Every day, I celebrate his life.
Every day, my father still shines.

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Happy Birth Day

Happy Birth Day

Each morning, this chance

to birth again the self—

to push it through

the canal of dream,

this chance to open

through the center

and let the new self emerge,

to marvel as it appears,

glistening with potential.

Of course the new self cries.

It needs to be warmed,

nourished, held.

Imagine what it’s like

to be that new—

to not believe any thought,

to not assume any thing.

Imagine what it’s like

to be that attentive,

that vulnerable.

Self, can you meet

each day

like that? Like that.

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This solar year, you will actually become the one you wished for. 

            —Holiday Mathis, horoscope

 

 

And so when Holiday Mathis tells me

that this is the year I will become

the one I wished for, I decide to believe her.

If it’s true, I will become sky, become river,

become aspen. Peace in my actions, truth

in my words, love in my every breath.

And though I’m unsure about horoscopes,

I decide to do everything I can to prove

her right, my thoughts already perhaps

a bit more fluid, a bit more blue.

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Every little thing she does is magic.

—The Police

 

 

through sirens, rush hour,

taxis, bright lights, windy streets

walks the Sierra Nevada

 

*

 

even in poor soil,

the yarrow thrives, excels

in beauty and biathlon

 

*

 

running with the half-wolf—

freedom

has six legs

 

*

 

a democrat and a republican

walk into a bar—

just sayin’

 

*

 

filling sippy cups

and playing taxi driver

the woman with several masters

 

*

 

places for adventure:

beach, mountain, ocean,

on the page

 

*

 

herbs on the rooftop

and their gardener both grow better

when sung Annie’s Song

 

*

 

two fine medicines—

So You Think You Can Dance,

bottle of wine

 

*

 

fixing the internet

and home audio system—

this tropical flower

 

*

 

every Wednesday

a democrat and a republican

go on a date

 

*

 

next chapter—

unable to read ahead,

she brings a lead rope to the cliff hanger

 

*

 

giant sequoia—

the longer she grows,

the more she has to give

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One Wonderful Man

 

for Clint on his 80th birthday

 

 

he brings wings to what is earthbound,

brings humility to the sky,

and to all that is, he brings song

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with thanks to Kyra

 

 

Minor and slow,

the Russian death song

on the cello

fills the room

with loss and beauty,

the two rubbing

together like notes

side by side on the scale

played at the same time.

I lay on the floor

beneath the great instrument

and feel the waves of it

as if they originate inside me—

play it again, I beg

the cellist, and then,

when it’s done, I beg her

again, play it again,

And she does. And she does,

the warm notes filling

any chill they find.

 

 

 

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Past the grave of the baby girl,

past the grave of the beloved mother—

“we loved her,” it says in italic letters—

and past the grave with my birthday on it,

we find a tombstone greened in moss

with its names and dates long since lost.

The grass has nearly reclaimed the stone,

and we sit here together and talk for hours,

joyful expressions of dust as we laugh

and cry and remember just why

it is so damn sweet to be alive, to practice

what it means to love in the face of our impermanence.

All the leaves have left for the year,

but look at what remains—the chance

for sudden, immeasurable bliss

no matter what the season is.

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On the Eve

The night before he turns eleven

the boy cannot sleep. He is so alive.

He jumps on his bed and makes up songs

and can’t stop telling me how much

he loves me. Every day he becomes

more his own, which is to say less mine.

There was a time I heard every word

that he said. There was a time I could hold

his entire body in a single arm. But I was never

able to make everything okay with a kiss

or a song, no matter how much I wanted to.

What a perfect rehearsal for now when

his heart is already practicing how to break

at the cruelness of boys and the spite of girls

and the burn of wanting something you can’t have.

Still, I hold him, knowing it won’t make things all better,

hold him through the ache when he lets me.

And tonight I delight with him in his jumping

and singing until it is time for quiet.

The boy cannot sleep. He buzzes above his sheets.

His life is somehow too much for his body.

He can’t contain it all, despite that his legs

are so long, his reach so wide. And this love

I have for him, so much bigger now than it was

when he was smaller, how can that be? Walking out

the bedroom door, I feel a surge of love leaping out

of my chest, leaking from my eyes.

I don’t even try to hold it in.

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