Almost every spring, I forget them,
the six packs of cosmos starts on the porch.
All it takes is one cold night,
an innocence of frost.
By dawn, the buds slightly droop.
By noon, the leaves hang darkened and limp.
By the next day, they’re black.
And dead.
It’s a familiar story. How one night
changes everything. How one day
I’m blooming, thriving, alive,
the next all I’d grown is gone.
I used to believe all was lost.
I used to throw the whole plant away.
But I learned what is dead serves as a blanket
to protect whatever still lives.
Wait, and in days, a tiny green filigree
emerges from the base.
In a month or two, it’s a bask of blooms,
no trace of how bleak it was.
Such tender study, the cosmos.
Blame is no part of their process.
They let what’s been lost be of service.
They know they are here to grow.
Posts Tagged ‘death’
Again. Again.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cosmos, death, frost, garden, spring on May 25, 2021| 2 Comments »
One Lifetime
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bird, death, life, red wing blackbird, spring on March 18, 2021| Leave a Comment »
on the way to the graveyard
taking a few detours through spring—
trill of red wing blackbirds
January 1
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged connection, death, grandmother, language, loss, new years on January 2, 2021| 3 Comments »
When I say Happy New Year,
I hear my grandmother’s voice
inside my voice, the way
she slapped the first syllable,
the way silence hung for a moment
before she finished the rest of the phrase.
HAP-py New Year!
Each time I say the words, she
is so alive in that moment—
the syllables themselves
wear her bright red nails,
her signature updo
and her rhinestone earrings.
HAP-py New Year!
I sing out again and again,
loving how she enters
each conversation this day.
There are small ways
to bring our beloveds back,
little rituals so strong they
defy the loss, so strong
that each time we do them
we become more and more
who we love. Her voice
becomes my voice and her
joy becomes my joy.
I don’t have to look in the mirror
to see she is here, her smile
my smile curving up from the inside.
The Hero of the Imogene Pass Run
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged angel, death, encouragement, jack pera, running on October 23, 2020| 8 Comments »
When I think of encouragement,
I think of Jack Pera,
who stood every year
at the top of Imogene Pass—
in snow, in sun, in sleet, in fog.
On race day, a thousand plus runners
would reach the top,
weary, having climbed
over five thousand feet in ten miles,
and Jack, he would hold out his hand
and pull each of us up the last foot,
launching us toward the long downhill finish.
I remember how surprised I was
the first time, and grateful,
grateful to feel him reaching for me,
grateful to feel his powerful grip
yanking me up through the scree.
“Good job,” he’d say to each one of us,
cheering us though we were sweaty
and drooling and panting and spent.
After that first race, I knew to look for him
as I climbed the last pitch,
trying to make out his form
at the top of the ridge.
And there was. Every time.
“Good job,” he’d say
as he made that last steep step
feel like flight.
There are people who do this,
who hold out their hand,
year after year,
to help those who need it.
There are people who carry us
when we most need it,
if only for a moment.
When I heard today Jack had died,
I couldn’t help but imagine
an angel waiting there above him
as he took his last breath,
an angel with a firm grip and a big smile
holding out a hand, pulling him through that last effort,
telling him, “Good Job, Jack. Good job.”
And may he have felt in that moment
the blessing of that encouragement,
totally ready to be launched into whatever came next.
Good job, Jack Pera. Good job.
Forecast
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, life, loss, Neruda on October 11, 2020| 6 Comments »
Nobody keeps any of what he has, and life is only a borrowing of bones.
—Pablo Neruda, “October Fullness,” trans. Alistair Reid
And if we can keep nothing of what we have
then let us love more right now. Naked as sunlight
and unapologetic as ripe apples. Let’s invent
new compassions and conjure new kindnesses
out of what seems to be dust.
And if life is only a borrowing of bones,
then let us use them well while we may.
Just today I ran through the corn maze
and marveled at the joy of being lost.
Bless these borrowed femurs and spines.
Bless these borrowed skulls.
And let us love more right now.
Though the forecast is for loss.
I Return to the Night after My Grandfather’s Funeral
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, grandfather, grandmother, grief on October 10, 2020| 6 Comments »
My grandmother asked me that night
to sleep with her in her bed.
Though I was thirty-something,
I knew little of loss. I remember
the great weight of her as she slipped
into the soft white sheets—
a mountain inside a woman’s body.
I wore a long flannel gown with tiny violets
and she a thin flannel robe, slightly pilled and well worn,
with tiny embroidered roses.
We hardly spoke. She did not cry.
Any night stitched with that much sorrow
will linger in the heart for a lifetime.
I did not hold her—nor did she seem
to wish to be held. And when I return
to that night in my mind, I don’t try
to rewrite it. She sleeps on her side of the bed.
I sleep where my grandfather used to sleep.
I listen for the eventual slow tide of her breath.
But I am not the same version of myself
who shared a bed with her then.
Now, when I lie down beside her,
I know something more of how vast
an emptiness can be. How it can feel as if
a whole garden has been ripped up by its roots.
How sometimes in the dark, though we know
there are stars, we simply can’t open our eyes.
Forecast
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, frost, garden, time on September 6, 2020| 8 Comments »
In two nights, the killing frost will come.
Because I know this, I wander the garden
and talk to the broccoli, the nasturtiums,
the cilantro. I thank the beets for their willingness
to grow. I tell the onions what is coming.
Tomorrow I will pick enormous bouquets
and fill the house with orange flowers.
Tomorrow I will sit in the garden
and try to store the beauty in my body
though I know it doesn’t work that way.
Please, just one more day, just one more month,
just one more life to try to get it right,
just one more chance to be as attentive
as I am when I know it is almost over,
the basil dark green, the marigolds crinkling with gold.
Learning
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, learning, life, shadow, tree on July 26, 2020| 2 Comments »
Today the shadows
teach me to love
what is dim,
the sweet respite
of obscurity
when the sun
is too much
and a tree
yields its shape
so that I might slip
my clumsy heat
out of the bounds
of the vertical world
and find instead
a cool dark pool
on the ground,
as if I’m a boat
that has discovered
at last
a slim calm eddy
in which I might rest.
This is perhaps
the way we start
to meet our deaths—
sliding into the relief
of these dark, quiet
channels.
Flourish
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, essence, growth, larkspur, rebirth, wildflower on May 27, 2020| 2 Comments »
Flourish
Whatever it is inside the larkspur
that says grow, grow, grow,
I want to know it, too. Want
to obey the voice that urges me on,
even in frost, even in rain.
I want to rise out of my own dried debris,
want to know how it is to die and return,
new and yet somehow the same.
And what is it that fuels the drive?
I want to know that— the divine
encouragement that knows
when to wait, when to push,
when to wilt, when to flourish,
when to swell into oh! bright bloom.
I want to know myself as wick,
to be lit, to be the fire itself.
After Hearing the Heartbreaking News
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, life, sadness, shoes on May 8, 2020| 15 Comments »
Tonight, life wears me like
an old pair of shoes. The kind
it can slip its feet into
without untying the laces.
The kind of shoes a mother
would probably throw out
thinking of the act as a favor.
Life is tired, tonight,
of running. Doesn’t want
to dress to impress. It just
wants to know that it goes on,
especially tonight when
events seem to point
to the contrary. And so
though I am down at the heel
and shabby, life slips into me
as if life depended on it.
And we walk in the moonlight,
cry. And howl. Then take another step.
And then another.
Still Swimming
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Corona Virus, death, hair, mom, parenting, river, son on May 4, 2020| 2 Comments »
And so I pull the purple comb
through my son’s thick hair,
the same way I’ve seen
the stylists do at Great Clips.
Wet the hair. Comb it through.
Part it. Hold it between
two fingers. Cut vertically. Snip,
and his hair falls to the floor.
Comb it through. Snip. Snip.
We both know that I
have no clue what I’m doing.
So we laugh as the hair
piles up on the floor.
We chatter, the way
a stylist and customer would,
talking of school and his friends
and his unruly cowlicks. Snip.
I remember that time
I was trapped underwater
by the river’s hydraulics,
how I stared up at the light
shining through the surface
and thought, I don’t think
it’s my time yet to die.
And the river spit me out
and I swam hard as I could
through the rapid toward shore.
I don’t think it’s my time yet
to die. Nor my son’s. Though
all around us the news of dying—
the numbers increasing every day,
stories of beloveds who are gone.
We ask ourselves, how do we
go on? And meanwhile, we do.
We go on. And because my son’s hair
is too long for his taste,
I learn how to cut it by cutting it.
How much more will we learn
as this goes on? How to share?
How to grieve? How to let go? How to live?
And meanwhile, life spits us out
into sunlight, and we come up
spluttering, gasping, surprised
we’re alive, and we swim, what a gift
to find we’re still swimming.
Viola Tricolor
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged blossoming, Corona Virus, death, flowers, medicine, showing up, spring, wildflowers on March 31, 2020| 2 Comments »
also known as Johnny jump up, heart’s ease, heart’s delight, come and cuddle me
Into the shade by the porch
bloomed the first wild pansy,
its small yellow face sunny
and eager and open.
The Athenians used to make
the tiny flowers into syrup
to moderate anger and
to comfort and strengthen the heart.
And here it is today,
small volunteer beauty,
growing in this patch of dirt
where nothing else wants to grow.
This tiny garden is but one of many
concurrent realities—others involve
hospitals short of beds, loved ones
gone, doctors scared to go home.
Our hearts need strengthening.
Little violet, we’re learning, too,
how to be surrounded by death
and still rise up, bring healing as we bloom.
One Return of Friendship
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Christmas, death, friendship, tree on December 15, 2019| Leave a Comment »
An Inner Alchemy
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, eulogy, friendship, haibun, poem, poetry, stewart warren on September 25, 2019| 6 Comments »
for Stewart Warren, now in hospice
It was the early 2000s. I was in Del Norte as an emcee showing movies for Telluride Mountain Film on Tour. From the stage, I could see in the dark audience a man who was almost beaming. He had “that light” about him. Did I know him? I wanted to. After the show he came up to say hi.
“Are you a poet?” I asked him. Why? Some hunch.
He nodded and tilted his head to the side. “Yeah.” That’s a word that when Stewart said it had three syllables.
Over a year later, Stewart Warren admitted to me that he hadn’t written many poems at that point. He was a drummer, but he had a poet heart. That was easy to see. At the time, I needed poets who were willing to travel and teach in the schools, and he was gloriously game. I invited him to Telluride, and he had the kids drum on the desks and write. He was equal parts goofy and glamorous, childlike and ageless, playful and profound.
After that he came here many times to teach, to perform, and many times just to help me with programs. He’d dress up in a sport coat and jeans and he’d be my right hand man, helping with details, making everything easier, smoother, more fun. One tricky thing: I’m a tea drinker and he disliked tea, called it “pond water.” After many visits, he finally showed up with a new coffee maker, the one I still have. “I know that all the poets who visit here in the future will be grateful,” he said.
And isn’t that Stewart—the one who jumps in with a devil-may-care grin and a plucky “yeah.” The one who, when given a big pair of shoes, finds a way to grow himself into them. The one who turned his own difficult story into a life out of helping others share their stories. The one who relentlessly continued to learn, to push himself, to inspire. The one who thought of what others would need, and then gave it. The one who brings out the best in others because he dares to bring out the best in himself.
*
September cottonwood
just before the barren time
turning itself into gold
*
Stewart, poet, drummer, partner, friend, web-master, tech-guide, word-sharer, heart-opener, I am a much better me because of you. Thank you. Thank you.
One Week Later
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, friendship, love, memory, poem, poetry on September 16, 2019| 4 Comments »
There are moments I forget she is gone.
Perhaps when I am in the garden. Or painting
rocks. Or making dinner. And then I remember.
She’s gone. I cry less now, but still.
I cry. Of course. Because the cloth I use to wipe
my glass table. Because the vase I slip
marigolds into. Because the necklace
I am wearing. Because out of nowhere
the sound of her voice. Because
the book I am reading. Because
when I think of how much she loved me,
how much I loved her, I gasp and
my nose starts to tingle and my eyes
well, and I know she would tell me
not to cry, but I do. Because it’s a beautiful
and rare gift to love someone. Deeply. Because
she was my gift. Because I was hers.
What I Did Not Write in the Card
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, friendship, love, poem, poetry on July 30, 2019| 6 Comments »
for S
I don’t want you to die.
I know that is selfish,
but it’s the truest thing.
I know we don’t speak of it.
I know I am supposed
to find acceptance,
to find metaphors about
rebirth and letting go—
the trees are always good that way—
but I don’t want to.
I hate that you are hurting.
I hate how far away you are.
You and I both know
that I would never write this
in your card. No, instead,
I send a metaphor about birds,
about resilience and
the gift of wings. Instead,
I tell you I love you.
It’s the other truest thing.
Ways to Go
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, living, poem, poetry on June 14, 2019| 1 Comment »
And if it gets colder and colder,
then I want to go out the way
the bean sprouts do—with their leaves,
though darkened, still in the shape of a heart.
And if it gets hotter and hotter,
then I want to go out like the ripples
that waver above the pavement
softening the edges of whatever can be seen.
And if Thanos really did snap his fingers
and half of all living creatures turned to dust,
I want to go like the Cheshire Cat,
my smile the last part of me to exist.
And if it’s a fast death, then
let me come back as a sparrow
so I can visit those I love
and sit on their porches and sing.
And if it’s a slow death, and I suppose
that’s what life is, may I talk too much about love.
May I go out saying thank you a thousand times
a day, astonished and gasping with praise.
One Unforgiving
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged basil, death, forgiveness, garden, poem, poetry on May 31, 2019| Leave a Comment »
basil on the porch
the morning after a frost
leaves limp and black things—
how greenly it met yesterday
no amount of I’m sorry will do
Strange Bedmates
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged celebration, death, grief, knitting, paradox, poem, poetry on April 3, 2019| 4 Comments »
grief and celebration
share the same bed—
one keeps stealing the blanket
the other
keeps knitting a beautiful new one
They Say It’s the Best Bloom in Ten Years
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bluebonnets, death, flower, friendship, life, love, poem, poetry, wildflowers on March 29, 2019| 6 Comments »
She wants to go see the bluebonnets, she says.
This is after she tells me they’ve said she has three months to live.
And I want to find her vast fields of bluebonnets,
acres and acres of white-tipped blue bloom.
And I want to send her more springs to see them in,
more days to live one day at a time. I want to remove
the pain in her belly, the pain that aggressively grows.
I want to make deals with the universe. Want to say no
to the way things are. I want to tell death to wait.
I want to tell life to find a way. I want to hug her
until she believes she’s beloved. I want to give her
the pen that will write every brave thing
that she’s been unable to say. There are days
when we feel how uncompromising it is, the truth.
How human we are. There are days when the bluebonnets
stretch as far as the eye can see. There are days
we know nothing is more important than going to see them,
a billion blue petals all nodding in the wind, teaching us to say yes.