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Posts Tagged ‘hug’

Three Teachers at the End of the Writing Retreat

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on October 13, 2024| 7 Comments »


                  for Uche and Jon
 
 
In a trio of ecstatic days
measured in boisterous laughter
and hours of impassioned conversations,
there was also that moment when,
at the end of a brilliant night,
we stood behind the stage,
our students still raucous
and basking in each other’s shine,
and we wrapped our arms around each other
and bowed our heads till they touched,
brow to brow to brow,
a moment so brief one could easily
miss it, but this, too, is history—
the quiet breath, the words
we didn’t have to say, the pressure
of our hands against each other’s backs,
the sweetness of standing out of the light,
tired and nodding to the beauty
pulsing all around us.

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One Impossible Hug

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on February 25, 2023| 4 Comments »




my arms still recall
the slender stem of your body—
oh, sweet empty circumference

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Twelve Seconds

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on June 29, 2019| 2 Comments »

 

It’s the time it takes
to sing up to “k.”
It’s two full cycles
of breath. It’s less time
than a red light, and nine
more seconds than it takes
for a cheetah to go from
zero to sixty.
It’s one fifth of a minute waltz.
It’s $4,629 more dollars
for Bill Gates.
And, my friend tells me,
it’s how long it takes
for a hug to stimulate
the vagus nerve and trigger
oxytocin, helping the heart
to slow down and the cortisol
levels to drop. All day,
I practice long embraces—
and while we hug
the earth rotates at least 5,520 meters
and the universe expands
over 816 kilometers.
All day, I notice
how darn good it feels.

 

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Because Often We Forget

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on February 8, 2012| 6 Comments »


Being human. It’s not what we think it is.
—Jude Janett

Sometimes when we hug
I swear the strands
of our DNA come unspiraled
and wrap themselves
around each other
as if to embroider
into our memory
the truth of how I
am you and you
are me and this
perhaps explains
why long after
we untangle our arms
and scents from each other
I feel how
what’s deepest in you
unfurls in me.

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