In every second, one hundred trillion neutrinos
pass through the body: One hundred trillion
subatomic particles move through us
as if we were sieves, no, as if we were nets
with holes so big that whole islands
travel through without us noticing.
It thrills me to think of the self so porous,
so leaky. Imagine if thoughts, too,
could clear us with so little friction,
so little effect. How many hopes and hurts
just today have I let stick? Imagine
them breezing through the aorta, imagine
them gliding through the brain, slipping through
the core of us, finding no purchase, no anchor.
Imagine the miracle that in any given moment
we don’t fall through our chair, our bed, the floor.
Imagine, permeable as we are, we still coalesce
enough to look at another, to see each other as whole.
We still manage to pick up the mesh of a phone,
succeed in moving our holey lips,
and hundreds of trillions of neutrinos later,
with total certainty, manage to promise a solid I love you.
Imagine, with these pervious hands
we might carry each other, might cradle
each other, might welcome each other home.
Posts Tagged ‘body’
And Mean It, Too
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged body, love, neutrino, science on February 15, 2021| 5 Comments »
Pneumonia
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged body, breath, breathing, friendship, healing on April 28, 2020| 4 Comments »
—for A
And if I could, I would breathe for you.
I would inhale and exhale and hold
your breath for you. For you I would
sigh and rant, I would hack and pant,
I would be your lungs if I could. I would
ease this ache, I would carry this pain,
I would take away fear, I would be
the wind, the wild mesa wind,
the late April wind that blows change
into all we thought we knew
and rearranges the meaning of here.
No one could ever speak for you.
But I would breathe for you, friend.
Please, breathe, please keep breathing.
I need you to breathe for you, breathe
for me, please, friend. I wish I could
breathe for you, breathe for you.
Re-Seeing the Obvious
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged body, life, miracle, poem, poetry, pregnancy, what is living this life on November 12, 2019| 2 Comments »
When pregnant, it was clear
I was along for the ride with a miracle.
Sure, I could eat organic broccoli,
walk and eschew caffeine,
but that was just taking care
of the vessel. Life itself
was doing the real work.
Imagine my surprise today
to realize I’m still along for the ride.
How did I ever kid myself
that I was in charge?
And oh, the bliss today
to notice anew these hands,
these eyes, these feet!
What joy to see them again
as the miracle they are,
to offer them in service to life.
While I Was Sleeping
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged body, dream, poem, poetry, sleep on September 30, 2019| Leave a Comment »
And while I was sleeping, dreaming yet again
of being on stage without knowing my lines,
my erector spinae muscles decided to wrestle
with bears and my rhomboids crash landed
after the parachute didn’t open. My levator
scapulae muscles lifted ten refrigerators and
my trapezii danced in stilettos for hours. Is it any wonder
I woke unable to move my neck? There are days
we realize just how grateful we are for parts
of the body we never could name
until today the bodyworker wrote them down,
how lucky we are to take them for granted.
There are days when we wake and realize
how much happens in our sleep. There are days
we think how much easier it would be
to just end up on a stage not knowing
our lines. Darn those bears. Darn those high heels.
Swimming to the Island
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged baptism, body, poem, poetry, swimming, water on September 2, 2019| 2 Comments »
I didn’t intend to swim to the island.
Told myself it was just a quick slip
into the water. Told myself I would
rejoin the others soon. But the water
said yes to me. And my arms and legs
seemed to remember then
exactly what they were made for.
Sometimes we’re in service to something
more primal, a voice that says go, go,
keep going, though there’s no race,
no finish line, no prize, no spectators,
nothing but the thrill of becoming
the body’s bright verb. Feel how
the water buoys you, even as your weight
pulls you down, how it shimmers as far as
a woman can swim, how with each
stroke of your dripping arms,
the lake christens you again and again
a child of this very here.
And Yet It Is Always Itself
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged biology, body, love, new beginning, newness, parenting, poem, poetry, stomach on August 13, 2019| 2 Comments »
The stomach replaces its lining
every four days. Every four days.
Because it’s so highly corrosive,
every four days it remakes itself
and becomes completely new.
Love, this is what I want to do.
Because sometimes we are acid.
Because sometimes we are cruel.
I want to start over every four days.
Every four days, let us be new.
A Woman Addresses Her Body
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged body, body image, woman on May 24, 2019| 7 Comments »
And though I curse you
and drive you and push you,
body, you hold me,
you carry the soul,
you transform the plum
and the leaf into laughter,
you make tears out of water
and wine. You leap
and you slump, you
sing and you hunger,
you skip and run and crawl.
You let me be part of the miracle
when you made a new body within—
building spine and brain and chin
and toe out of broccoli and coffee and toast.
And when I am clumsy,
you wear the scars to remind me
where we have been. You
change, you soften, you rearrange.
You heal, you insist, you rest.
How, after all these years,
do I still find ways to ignore you?
You who have carried me across finish lines,
you who have held the weeping child?
Why, when I look in the mirror,
do I do anything but marvel
at your skill? Imagine, you breathe
without my command. You regenerate cells.
You tell the blood where to go and when.
Oh body, I’m sorry. I have hurt you. And you,
you hold me like the child that I am,
and you breathe me, you teach me,
you let me try again.
Yes, That’s When
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged body, body image, nature, poem, poetry, walking on May 23, 2019| Leave a Comment »
I like my body when I’m in the woods
and I forget my body. I forget that arms,
that legs, that nose. I forget that waist,
that nerve, that skin. And I aspen. I mountain.
I river. I stone. I leaf. I path. I flower.
I like when I evergreen, current and berry.
I like when I mushroom, avalanche, cliff.
And everything is yes then, and everything
new: wild iris, duff, waterfall, dew.
this poem can be found in Hush (Middle Creek Press, 2020)
Crossing the Line
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged acceptance, body, poem, poetry on September 19, 2016| 1 Comment »
Mi casa es su casa.
My arms are your arms.
My lips are your lips.
My ripeness, yours. My triceps,
yours. My hunger, my nipples,
my skin, my swollen pinks
are yours, yours. And why stop there?
My dry elbows, your elbows.
My bunions, your bunions.
My cyst, your cyst. What part
of me would you rather not love?
Could you miss it? Tell me you will also take
my thinning skin, my widening hips,
my wrinkled cheek, my cracked heel.
If my fear is your fear; my ugly,
your ugly; my broken, your broken;
my shame, your shame, then kiss me
there. Again. Please? Kiss me there.
At the Edge of July
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged aging, body, poem, poetry, summer on June 23, 2016| 2 Comments »
Summer, what could you say to this body,
this body nearing its autumn?
What could your flowers teach this heart
about blooming despite heat, despite drought?
What could your shortening days tell this woman
about opening to light?
Summer, I think I know too much.
Teach me warm. Teach me thunderstorm.
Teach me how to be green, and then greener.