Posted in Uncategorized, tagged fortunetelling, found poem, inquiry, parenting, poem, poetry on November 15, 2015| 1 Comment »
a found poem, written verbatim
So, she says, what do you want to know about your future?
Will I be happy? I say.
Yes, she says.
Will I find true love? I say.
She says, You already have.
Will I be a good mother, I say.
She nods and says, Yes.
Will I write poems until I die?
She says, what if there is no “Will I?”
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged inquiry, poem, poetry, question, universe on September 18, 2014| 4 Comments »
Sometimes, if you ask
the right question,
and there are infinite
right questions to ask,
then the world cracks,
not in a way that makes
it more broken, but
cracks in a way
that makes it more whole,
as if you’ve been living
in a glass tank without
knowing the glass
were there. But oh!
after the shattering,
when someone asks you,
“Does the universe
act on us or do we act on
the universe,” you feel
in your breath and your
pulse that you and the universe
are the very same thing,
you feel it with absolute
certainty even as your
mind races
to find the place
where the glass
used to be.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged inquiry, love, need, poem, poetry, story, Tricycle Magazine on April 18, 2014| 1 Comment »
We tell stories about who we are and what life is, but seldom see that they’re only stories. The good news is that the truth is never far away. It’s right here, in fact, posing as backdrop.
—Erik Hansen, “The Island,” Tricycle Magazine
Tonight the truth is posing as a short-haired cat,
gray and increasingly white muzzled.
She wants love. Now. She will scratch
for it, push for it, shove for it, yowl.
She has been left alone too long and
her black spine rises up to meet my hand
as I reach down toward her back. Not enough.
She leaps up and curls herself into an island
on my lap. People are usually more polite.
Unless we pout. Send darts with our eyes
with a note attached to the shaft that says,
Fuck you. I need you. Goddammit. Now. Please?
Oh the truth. How it messes everything up.
Like the story that says, I need your love.
It’s got so much drama, so much pull.
That story, a woman could build a whole life
around it before she ever thought to ask herself,
Is that true? The cat curls deeper into
my lap. I feel the tug toward the love
that I call you. My spine arcs as it rises up,
starving for your touch. My claws
come out as I start to purr. Who says
it has to make sense. I’ll do
whatever it takes to make you close.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged chosen, inquiry, knowing, poem, poetry, unknowing on March 11, 2014| 2 Comments »
in the sweets shop
standing in front of the shelves
unable to choose—
realizing that I am the one
who wants to be chosen
*
unable to see
the mountain at the end
of the clouded valley—
never once doubting
it is still there
*
choose me, choose me,
choose me, I say to the world,
but of course I mean
choose me
the way I want to be chosen
*
outside, of course,
preferably in the sun, far
away from all
other eyes, an inchworm takes
all day to measure one lily
*
all day asking
myself, what would be lighter,
and even lighter
than this, all day I land
more softly
*
who is the one
who thinks she wants to be chosen?
leaning into the
infinite whatever it is
that notices her wanting
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged darkness, inquiry, light, poem, poetry, shadow, surrender on October 17, 2012| 2 Comments »
I have been living
closer to darkness
than I thought.
See how my shadow
is longer than the woman
who makes it. It moves
with me at the same pace,
every step.
I have tried to push back
the darkness. I have tried
to hold only light.
As if it were a war.
As if to be in darkness
were bad. And who is it
that is afraid of the dark?
And what would happen
if I let it swallow me whole?
I walk out into the night.
I look up. The light
on the corner gets in the way.
It is a long time
before I see the stars.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged haiku, inquiry, poems, poetry, separation, tanka, unity on February 29, 2012| 2 Comments »
are you sharing it
with me, this
loneliness?
*
how do they do it,
those birds, keeping a course
through the gale
when even in this still, still room
I can hardly take one step
*
alone is more
alone than
I thought
*
as I fall
I feel how this, too,
is dancing
*
that small voice,
quiet as petals, says
why not be the one
who tears down any wall
that stands between two hearts
*
falling, falling,
I don’t know when I stopped
wanting to be caught
*
new snow in the field
the only tracks there
one woman dancing
*
they sure do mess up
the sheets—excitement
and grief
*
who is the one
that falls and who is the one
who notices her falling
*
midnight.
the power out, I make
of myself a light
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, doors, haiku, inquiry, knowing, listening, not knowing, poem, weeds, winter on January 13, 2012| 1 Comment »
first the stars
then all the space between the stars
slipped into my tea
*
dried and dead
I leave them in the vase
the naked tulips
*
winter
every cloud
a love letter
*
hey poet
get out of the way
said the poem
*
bird on the wire
for a few moments
we both stop singing
*
the weeds gone to seed—
and who is this one
who thinks they are weeds
*
another door,
another door, another wall
becomes a door