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Posts Tagged ‘flow’

In the Flow

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , on January 4, 2024| 12 Comments »


 
Where else has it been,
the water that flows today
in the river beside me?
What song would it sing
of otherwhere? And other
otherwhere? And what
could it teach me of flow?
I think of how I carry with me
all the places I have been—
old cities with cobblestones
and mountaintops above the trees
and aspen glades and dark corners
that stink of sweat and piss
and bright hospital rooms and
cemeteries on hills.
Who would I be without
every trail I have hiked,
every bed I have tossed in,
every table where I’ve wept?
Watch how the waves seem
to stay in the same place
though the water that makes them
is never the same, a fact
that thrills me again and again.
Who will take my place here
when my own water flows on?
Or will the wave disappear
as after a flood?
And who has come before me
making this wave I call my life?
How easily it changes the day
to know self as a drop
in the stream.

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Almost Imperceptible

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on February 9, 2022| 6 Comments »




The winter river
flows beneath
the ice,
then enters
low below
my thoughts,
its song
so slow
I almost miss
its strains,
how all is current—
dying, living,
gaining, losing,
forgetting and
remembering—
how all is
stagnant,
all is
change.

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Riparian

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on April 28, 2020| Leave a Comment »

To be known by the river—
that is what I wanted,
which is to say,
to know the self
as the river knows it,
as something that might be carried,
something that will be eroded,
something that might wade
into the center and then join
in the flow of all things.

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The Guru Said Stop Putting on the Brakes

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on September 22, 2019| Leave a Comment »

from a dream inspired by Sharon

 

 

And I tried. I tried.

Except steep hills. Except

stop signs. Except fear.

 

Then one day,

the brake simply

didn’t work anymore.

 

I thought perhaps

I’d forgotten which pedal

was the brake.

 

I tried flooring the pedal,

anyway, though I knew

it wouldn’t work.

 

At first, I hated it. Was terrified,

really. Then—right through

the intersection,

 

right down the steepest hill—

there it was, I was in it,

the flow, the flow.

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Small Glimpse of Grace Over Dinner

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on June 2, 2016| 1 Comment »

 

 

 

And so when Fred said,

“We become our own misunderstanding,”

I could see how I had become

like the rock in the river

that stands in the way

of all that moves forward,

and also I knew that

in spite of my very best attempts

at rock-ness, the river

would flow and flow.

 

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The Pleasures of Flow

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on October 9, 2012| 2 Comments »

The great gift, contrary to assumption,
is to disappear.

—Barry Spacks, The Pleasures of Flow

Like the scent of lemon
once intense in bare hands.
Like cottonwood leaves—
how they flee
first in heaps
and then one
by one
leaving empty
degrees of space.
Like the last note
of the solo cello
after the bow
has stilled.
Like stars
in the face
of one
great star
so close
to us.
Like
the taste
of a kiss
that persists
long after
the lips
are
gone.

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Release

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on September 12, 2012| 3 Comments »

Something softens when we enter the flow.
—Joi Sharp

Not that I didn’t try to find the shore.
I scraped at the stones, grasping as I passed,
clawing until my fingers bled. Not that I didn’t try
to stall in the eddy where I spiraled down,
down. I tried. I tried. What if, instead, I had
fallen in love with the angry swirl, fallen in
love with the waves’ white froth, fallen in love
with the chill, the roil. It did not last, the chaos. It delivered
me to the warm quiet water that also did not last.
At one point, though, it happened, through no effort
of my own, the small unvoice in me began to whisper,
world I love you, world I love you, world I love
you I said to the rocks, to the shore, to the heron
standing in the center of the stream as I passed.

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Tanka

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on August 6, 2012| 4 Comments »

the river song
fills the evening—an homage
not to flow
but to what
stands in its way

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