with thanks to Zhim
In fact, he didn’t write my name.
In fact, he wrote his own.
Inserting my own name came naturally.
Give up Rosemerry.
How thrilling the sentence became.
“A balancing counterweight,” he wrote,
“for a being who has extreme passion.”
The words swirl in me like a storm.
On a day when the news is of conquering,
this simple direction toward surrender.
I become a student of snow.
Give up Rosemerry. Give up.
What beauty arrives as I let go?
Posts Tagged ‘identity’
Give Up Rosemerry, He Wrote in His Letter
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged identity, letting go, surrender on January 4, 2026| Leave a Comment »
Inner Girl
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged dad, daughter, identity, nickname on July 6, 2025| 9 Comments »
I don’t know why he started calling me Roxanne,
but sometime in high school that’s what Dad did.
No matter it wasn’t my name. I loved how it made
me feel—something just ours. Dad had a way
of doing that—making a person feel seen, feel
uniquely known to him. And so today,
on his birthday, I imagined Dad could see me
through the veils of death. I talked to him as usual
as I weeded the garden bed. Told him about
the four river otter that showed up in the pond today,
how they slid their dark slick bodies across the top
of the water and dined on crawdads for hours.
As always, Dad didn’t talk back. Then, tonight,
at a party, when a woman introduced herself
as Roxanne, I stared at her, stunned, then unraveled
into tears. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I know it’s strange
to have a person start to weep when you tell
them your name.” She was kind to me all
the same. Just hearing someone say the word
I understood how much I miss hearing him
say it, miss the person I am with him.
It’s as if a door has been locked for years—
the door through which I am Roxanne.
Someone silly. Treasured. Supported. Known.
Hearing the name again felt like a key,
a gift on his birthday. It didn’t bring him back,
but it revived a forgotten part of me.
Even now, she is writing this poem.
Sitting Beside the Meyer Lemon Tree with Sherry
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged friendship, identity, legacy effect on April 28, 2025| 8 Comments »
I wasn’t thinking about the roots.
I was thinking of the intensely sweet
perfume, both heavy and bright
in the cool spring air.
I was thinking how much scent
comes from such small creamy flowers,
and how I wanted to save this floral
fragrance like a portal for remembering Sherry
in her black and white boots,
her red poppy necklace, her red spectacles,
and the conversation we had earlier
about what she called “The Legacy Effect”
in which we honor how events
and actions from long ago
still affect who we are today—
like the way she longs to find
the woman from college
who scrunched down her ankle socks
instead of folding them neatly down.
Sherry wants to write her a thank you letter
for changing the way she saw the world—
starting with her socks!
Enamored as I was with the lemon tree scent,
only later did it occur to me to thank not just
the flowers but the roots—shallow and fibrous.
How many roots are inside each of us,
spreading way beyond our own canopy?
How long would the thank you list be
if we named everyone and everything
that made us who we are? How invisible
and essential. Our perfume is their legacy.
One Side Effect
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged identity on July 3, 2024| Leave a Comment »
scrubbing off my worry,
my name
washed off, too
In Conversation
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged connection, conversation, identity, language, love, words on January 25, 2024| 12 Comments »
The sound of your voice
enters me and becomes me—
becomes synapse, becomes pulse,
becomes blood, becomes breath.
And in this way, the more I listen to you,
the more I become you.
It is no small thing to converse.
Sometimes I swim in the wild honey
of your words. Sometimes I break
on their jagged shores.
Some words become pillars that hold up
what is possible.
Others are wrecking balls
that turn to rubble all I thought I knew.
How fleeting it is, any grasp
of who we are. This is why,
hour after month after year
I welcome your words—
I like what they do.
Even when they are not easy to hear,
I love who I become
when I listen to you.
Skiing in the Dark
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged darkness, identity, skiing on January 13, 2024| 8 Comments »
Though you know by heart
this valley with its river,
its sheer red walls,
its ragged peaks,
in this moment all you see
is the dull glow of snow
a few feet in front of you
and dim shadows almost
suggesting the track,
and the whole world shrinks
to lungs and legs and stroke
and glide and it feels so good
to be outside, to move
through night guided more
by ears and less by eyes,
to slide through the world
a foot at a time and whoever
you were before this,
that’s not who you are now,
sweet creature of heartbeat,
stranger to the next moment.
Identity Check
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged breath, dream, identity on June 6, 2021| 2 Comments »
When they asked
for my identity card
I looked in my purse
and found someone else’s.
And someone else’s.
And someone else’s.
But not mine.
But it’s me, I said.
I turned to my friends
so they could vouch for me,
but their word was not enough
to prove I was myself.
When I woke,
I leaned deeper
into my being, my breath
giving me what no card,
no word could do.
Even the flesh is a trick.
Oh, how the morning shines.
Dear America,
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged America, American Flag, community, election, identity, United States of America on November 6, 2020| 8 Comments »
I am your daughter.
I have marched in your main street parades,
and in my yard I fly your flag.
I pledge allegiance and sing your anthem.
My uncle and grandfather fought in your wars.
My other grandfather came to your shores
as a young boy and stayed to raise your powerlines.
I climb your mountains and work your soil
and pick up trash on your highways.
I love you, America.
I vote in your polls and raise your children
and volunteer in your schools.
And because you are America,
I pay your taxes and call my senators
and protest in your streets.
I read your poets, relearn your history,
travel your back roads and cheer your teams.
You made me, America.
And I pray for you. And I pray in the way I choose to pray
because we can do that in America.
America, did we forget
our differences are what make us great?
Remember, America, the dream!
The wind is fierce today,
and I love the way it inspires the flag to wave into life.
Whatever is fierce around us is an invitation
to show up. Whatever is difficult
is a call to bring our best.
Whatever is uncertain is a chance
to be clearer in our thoughts, more generous in our speech.
America, it’s not a president
that makes our country great—
it’s us. How we treat each other.
How we meet our mistakes.
How we become the wind that raises the flag.
How our own hearts must be the home of the brave.
One More Layer
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged clothes, identity, losing the self on June 5, 2020| 4 Comments »
the more I wear this story
of myself, the more
it grows thin, ravels,
a sweater filled with holes—
I fall through them
Other Shoes
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Corona Virus, friendship, healing, identity on May 5, 2020| 8 Comments »
We all belong to the same galactic oneness.
—Carlos Santana, Master Class
I could be the doctor who, overwhelmed
in the ER, went home and killed herself.
I could be the sixteen-year-old boy
who had to cover his father with a white sheet
before the coroner arrived.
I could be the white sheet.
I could be the lawmaker unable to sleep,
or her pillow that hears her cry out in fear
when at last the sleep arrives.
I could be the rhythmic hissing of the ventilator
or the wail of the wife, or the weary hum
of the custodian beneath her mask
as she wipes the surfaces clean.
It could be me, the eleventh death
in the town next door to mine.
It could be me, the one who
unknowingly makes you sick
because I don’t know I carry
something deadly inside my breath.
And so I don’t hug you when I see you
across the post office lobby,
though my heart leaps up to hold you.
Because you could be the flat line
on the EKG.
Because you could be number twelve.