From eggs
the size
of small
jelly beans
come these
two beaks
that peak
beyond the
edge—today
they save
me, these
two tiny
wingless things.
Even this
bruised heart
remembers how
to marvel.
Posts Tagged ‘hope’
In the Hummingbird Nest Outside My Window
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bird, hope, hummingbird, nature, nest, poem, poetry on July 6, 2019| Leave a Comment »
Some People Choose to Believe, Some Don’t
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged belief, hope, lie, parenting, poem, poetry, Santa on February 11, 2019| Leave a Comment »
The hope that is left after all your hopes are gone—that is pure hope, rooted in the heart.
—Brother David Steindl-Rast
And so tonight when my daughter says to me,
Mom, are you Santa Claus? I ask her if it
would make a difference, and she says, Yes.
I don’t want him to just be a hoax for making
kids be good. And I say, I’ve never thought of Santa
that way. I think of him as generous. And magic.
And she says, But magic’s not real, and I say,
Some magic is. And she says, Well, it would
make sense. You always know what we want
because you’re the mom. And I tell her,
It is my great privilege to work for Santa,
and she says, What do you mean? And I say,
Well, you know, buying presents. And she says,
Why do you think he didn’t bring us a big present
this year, like he did last year? And I hear
in her voice, against all fact, hope,
the hope that lingers when hope is gone,
a pure hope, the hope that goodness is real,
that there is generosity beyond comprehension,
that some magic is real. She rolls over in the dark.
I keep hope rooted in my heart.
Several Hours Before Dawn: Another Moon Poem
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged hope, moon, poem, poetry, wonder on January 3, 2019| 2 Comments »
It appears still, the crescent moon,
but it’s moving at 2,288 miles per hour,
its light reaching us in less than two seconds.
This morning, we marvel at it, as if
we’d never seen moon before, its light
somehow touching us newly.
And though we are dashing down
the highway at fifty-eight miles per hour,
watching the moon, I feel something
in me quiet and still. Years ago, a friend told me
it was time to stop writing moon poems.
How to stop when each time
we see the moon, something new in us rises
to meet it? May we always write moon poems,
whether or not anyone reads them.
May we always marvel at the light
and shadow so far past our reach
and yet travelling with us
every day, every night. May it always feel
important, like hope, impossible to touch
and so real, so true.
How to Unshovel the Snow: An Evening Conundrum
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged hope, poem, poetry, shoveling, snow, thoughts on December 27, 2018| 6 Comments »
It’s not so much that you want the snow
back in the drive, it’s just that your back
felt so much better before the shoveling,
and so, using your sideways logic, you think
to yourself that if the snow were unshoveled
your back might unhurt. And while
you’re at it, you think you might unthink
those thoughts you thought the night before
shoveling the drive. Though they didn’t
amount to any action, now that you’ve
thought them they’ve become a frame
that’s changed everything. So you start
with the snow, because revising that seems easier
than anything else, but to shovel it back
in the drive would seem to exacerbate
the problem with the back, so
you consider ways the snow might unfall,
all of them fanciful. At least for a while,
it amuses you, the idea of ten million
million snowflakes rising, but then
the reality of drought returns and you
feel guilty for unwishing the snow. No,
better to put your hope in perseverance,
better to put your hope in healing.
It happens. And you walk up the drive,
so snowless and clear you can safely look up
at the sky and see all those stars. The snow
gathers whatever light there is. It can’t
unshine. You thrill a bit in the chill. Some
of the shine reaches into you. Some of it stays.
On a Difficult Day
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged fear, hope, poem, poetry, prayer, support on January 17, 2018| 13 Comments »
Because I don’t know how to pray,
I do what I know to do,
which is to sit very quietly
and let myself feel. To hold you
without holding you.
To imagine your fear
and breathe into it.
To feel my own fear
and walk the edges of its cliffs.
To lean on hope with its flimsy
net and feel how little it takes
to catch us, to save us.
Mushroom Hunting in the Morning
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged chanterelles, hope, mushroom hunting, poem, poetry on August 15, 2017| Leave a Comment »
Just as you give up,
there, through the trees,
you see a clearing
and though it’s exhausting
to be hopeful again
when there’s so little
to show for your hope,
you walk to the clearing
and there in the moss,
hundreds of chanterelles.
When you leave
to reenter the broken world,
some of the hope
sticks to you like tiny burrs,
able to seed themselves
anywhere you carry them.
By noon, nearly everything
seems possible.
There Shouldn’t Be Any More Poems About Rainbows, But
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged hope, poem, poetry, rainbow on July 20, 2017| Leave a Comment »
double rainbow to the east—
I stand in the rain and watch
as its colors deepen—
something small inside me
grows brighter, bright enough
Hope always comes easier
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged hope, morning, poem, poetry on June 20, 2017| 4 Comments »
Hope always comes easier
when it’s morning.
When birds are already weaving
their music through the trees.
Easier when dew
glitters on the leaves.
Easier when the world is warming.
In these ripening moments
it’s hard to remember
was it only hours ago
how darkness poured over you
like oil in the ocean.
Nothing seemed possible then.
But here is the bright red neck
of morning, humming through
shadows on emerald wings,
and here you are,
rising to meet it, not
because you want to, but
because something in you rises
and carries you with it into the day.
Before the Sun Returns
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged hope, poem, poetry on June 1, 2017| 2 Comments »
On this gray morning,
I want to give you
the yellow of the oriole,
the way it weaves through
the invisible weight of the air.
So much touches us
we cannot see,
and we wonder why
we feel heavy.
I would give you, too,
the gray whirr of the wings
of the hummingbird,
their improbable accuracy
as they negotiate the world
in search of what is sweet,
and I would give you joy
your own fine feet
still learning to master
this art of moving
across the world
one step at a time,
this art of living into the pause
between footsteps—
that moment when
the body lifts
as if we, too, could fly.
we feel heavy.
I would give you, too,
the gray whirr of the wings
of the hummingbird,
their improbable accuracy
as they negotiate the world
in search of what is sweet,
and I would give you
your own fine feet
still learning to master
one step at a time
and the long pause
in between.
One Emergence
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged emergency, hope, moon, poem, poetry on March 21, 2017| Leave a Comment »
This Began as a Poem About Desperation
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged desperation, hope, lemon, poem, poetry on March 19, 2017| 2 Comments »
But darn if that scent of lemon
isn’t just so yellow, and though
I meant to write about the squeeze
of fear, there’s that bright perfume
on my fingertips and all I can think
is how full of sunshine it is, that scent,
though the room is dark,
though the last thing I thought
I could write about tonight
was hope.
Mine Tour
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged emergence, hope, mine, poem, poetry on July 14, 2016| 1 Comment »
We sat in the stope, a small room
chiseled and blasted into the stone
1,800 feet below the surface.
Imagine, he says, it is 1899.
First the guide turned out the light.
Then he blew out the candles.
As we sat in the dark, he told us
that only those with a good memory
of how they got in here
would make it back out alive.
Then he turned back on the light.
Sometimes in a darkness,
we feel ourselves trapped,
find ourselves unable
to grope our way back
to some beginning.
In our attempts to emerge
we become increasingly lost.
Sometimes in a darkness,
we come to believe it will always
be dark. How could we know
to hope that by some strange
luck or chance or change
a light might appear
so bright that we would never
again lose our way?
I’ve Heard It In the Chillest Land
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged autumn, frost, garden, hope, poem, poetry on September 22, 2015| 1 Comment »
Already the frost has come,
both intricate and merciless,
and it has taken the basil,
the green beans, the zinnias
and whatever hope we had
that summer might never end.
We knew our hope was irrational,
but that’s never stopped a hope before.
Every day there’s more evidence
against hope—the headlines,
the angry boy down the street,
the child bride in Afghanistan.
And still it rises up, slightly
browned, but still shining
like that marigold bloom that was hiding
beneath a sunflower leaf—
it should be frosted and dead, but
it’s not. Damn hope. Never
acting the way we think it will.
May it trick us forever into choosing
to live another day. And after a long winter
when we’re sure it’s gone, may it always
reseed, putting up dozens of starts.
Not all of them will make it. Some will.
One Unglimmering
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged dawn, hope, poem, poetry on April 23, 2015| 1 Comment »
before the dawn
the possibility of dawn—
all night holding that
How It Is We Stay Together
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bridge, hope, partnership, poem, poetry, river, stubbornness on March 18, 2015| 3 Comments »
It’s true, sometimes the river can’t be wide enough
between me and you. God knows it’s cold in there.
And deep. And full of secrets I don’t ever want to know.
And that old bridge joining us, sometimes I pray it falls.
Tell myself it’s better that way, what, with you over there
and no way to get over here except to swim—and I know
you won’t do that. Yeah, I say, it’s better that way,
you and me just keeping our distance. In fact,
sometimes I pretend it’s gone already, that old bridge.
But then next thing I know, I’m making up smoke signals
to say hey, there’s a really pretty light on the water tonight,
and hey, I’m wishing you would tell me that story again, the one
your mama used to tell to you when you were scared.
And that’s when I know that if that bridge collapsed,
well, I would build a new one with all my resources—
my stubbornness, my hope, my hands. It is hard
to build a bridge out of stubbornness and hope.
But I would. Sometimes it’s all we have.
But Sometimes I Forget
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged darkness, hope, light, poem, poetry on September 13, 2014| Leave a Comment »
Is it truly dark, or is this darkness
like what we call night—
nothing more than our backs
turned to the sun.
It is not the light that has changed.
It’s a matter of where we stand.
Though I know this, the night
appears no less dark.
Sometimes, when I
lose hope for the world,
I ask myself if I have lost hope in you,
if I have lost hope in me.
Always the answer
is the same.
By now you would think
I would never forget
that the sun is only one
of many, many lights.
Let’s Walk Through It Together Haiku
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged darkness, door, haiku, hope, poem on December 15, 2012| 2 Comments »
between the night
and the fear, a door appears
a dark bird sings, sings
how things change tanka
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged change, hope, poem, poetry, possibility, tanka on August 18, 2012| 3 Comments »
not right away
but at some point
it happened,
this barren, sterile field
began, so many shades, to bloom
Camping in the Monsoon Tanka
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged camping, hope, monsoon, poem, rain, surrender, what is on July 18, 2012| 3 Comments »
wet hair,
wet dress, wet feet
wet eyes
across the field
blue sky
The Second Law of Thermodynamics Gives a Pep Talk
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged 84, hope, inspiration, light, poems, poetry, radiance, thermodynamics on March 3, 2012| 1 Comment »
Even the tiniest
coldest
most distant
atoms
in the universe
release
light
my dear one
it is not
so dark
*
*
This is the first in a series of 84-character poems on radiance, one of the 11 powers of the universe that Brian Swimme outlines in EnlightenNext. He writes, “In my view, the power of radiance is an expression of the mysterious way in which the universe cannot contain the magnificence it houses. Instead, it is compelled to express itself in ten million different ways.”