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Posts Tagged ‘song’

Little Explorer

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on August 24, 2025| 4 Comments »


 
 
To walk in the woods
is a kind of prayer.
Come in on quiet feet
and feel how you are not
alone. The golden trees
are full of eyes.
What are those sounds
you cannot name?
Whatever is untamed
inside you sings along.
Dwarfed by awe,
you might feel small,
but the song says,
you are all.
 

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Fräulein

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on August 20, 2025| 4 Comments »

Just because it’s a song about a man leaving a woman
and realizing he still loves her doesn’t mean

it isn’t also a song about a mother and a daughter
singing their hearts out in a car, both of us

falling in love with what the human voice can do
and what a song can do when two people choose

to sing it together, over and over, until it becomes
our anthem, until it becomes the glue in something

larger than we are, something less about the words
and more about the transmission of love,

the shared moments in which we come together
to sing it, you on the melody with Tyler Childers,

me on the harmony with Colter Wall. And the more
we sing it, the more I’m in love not just with the song,

but with you, because no matter what the song is about,
it’s our song, and we choose to sing it again and again,

because joy, because the way two voices come together
as one, even out of tune, because, Fräulein, this song is ours.

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In Harsh Times

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on July 4, 2025| 10 Comments »


 
I know, music alone
will not save us. But tonight
when my daughter played
the song we both love,
we smiled at each other,
all giddy and warm,
and some shriveled
part of me revived.
It was like those seeds
in the desert that wait years
to germinate—all they need
is one good rain.
That’s what a song can do.
Remind us our hope
is merely dormant, not dead.
Who could blame me, then,
for wanting to bring a song
to the whole thirsty world,
a song that soaks into
our parched hearts,
stunning us with just how fast
even the harshest world
can transform.

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For Now

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on June 20, 2025| Leave a Comment »

a solstice song
 
 
Nothing to do but open,
nothing to do but close,
nothing to do but undo,
nothing to do but love.

Self as wind in the forest,
yes, self as both forest and wind,
self as unfolding unself
that closes and opens again.

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Praise Song

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on June 19, 2025| 2 Comments »

I went outside to sing a song to the thunder
as the thunder sang through the graying sky,
and while I was singing a secret song,
the thunder sang through me.
I went out to sing a song to the thunder
as it rumbled through the expanded air
and the thunder entered the rain and the earth
and the thunder entered me.
I went out to sing a song to the thunder,
and I was also the thunder.
And the thunder was also the branch and the pond
and the thunder was also me.
I went out to sing a song to the thunder
and there was nothing that was not thunder—
not even the silence, not even the song,
yes, even the longing to sing.

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After Not Seeing Her for a Year

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on March 27, 2025| 2 Comments »


for Deb
 
 
I held the tall and solid
song of her in my arms,
held her the way
a note clings to a staff,
as if for a moment,
I could anchor myself
to the years of shared
laughter. I miss you,
I said. And she said,
That is how it is.
What a gift, these five words.
They did not try to fix,
nor did they ignore
the ache of missing.
As if she were helping me
rekey my thoughts into bitonality—
a melody written in love
with a harmony written
in ache. For a while longer
then, I held her because
I could. And moments
later I rehearsed again
how to let her go.
No part of it
was not beautiful.

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Letter to My Heart

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on March 8, 2025| 6 Comments »


 
Once I was embarrassed
you were a mockingbird.
I wished you were more
hermit thrush, more meadowlark,
more cliff swallow in the canyon,
heck, even wished you were
robin or wren.
At last I’m coming to see
the gift of learning another’s song,
letting it pierce you, own you,
then braiding it with your own tune,
to sing back to the world
as one.

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The Great Chorus

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on February 18, 2025| 4 Comments »


 
 
We all live together in a home
in which the rooms are
made of song. Fierce
songs of resistance. Wounded
songs that rise like sirens and
drown out every other song, till
once again, we hear the tendrilled
song of opening. Chants
of freedom. Wild song
of belonging. Sweet lullaby
of trust. What moment cannot
be met through song? Even
the greatest heartache, even
the greatest joy, even
the smallest hope knows
itself not only by its melody, but
by who is willing to sing along and
who is courageous enough to listen.

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And Then, All at Once, Song

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on January 18, 2025| 8 Comments »




in the barren cottonwood tree
dozens of birds, all of them still,
as if, like me, they are enthralled
doubtful they could ever improve
on all this glorious silence

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For the Heartbroken

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on December 8, 2024| 19 Comments »

 

 
 
I don’t know if there are angels,
but if there are, do they weep for us?
With all the beauty they know could be,
do they weep for all the pain we sow,
weep each time we hurt the world?
I don’t know if there are angels,
but sometimes when my own tears come,
I imagine the angels gather me
in their great and tireless arms,
and their tears mix with mine as they whisper,
That’s right, dear, feel everything.
We feel it all, too. That is why we sing.

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