without a map
I row my small canoe—
a leash of moonlight
Posts Tagged ‘surrender’
One on the Eve of the New Year
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged moon, new year, poem, poetry, surrender on January 1, 2018| 2 Comments »
For Two Hours Beside the Highway
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged confucius, flat tire, lute, poem, poetry, surrender on September 28, 2017| Leave a Comment »
Sitting in the rain
in the dark
with three good tires
I think of Confucius,
who, when arrested
by accident didn’t fuss,
rather sat in his cell for five days
playing lute until his story
untangled and he
was set free.
It is dry in the car,
and though the radio works,
I do not turn it on.
I never learned
to play lute,
but sense that perhaps
I am being played, what
with this long neck,
with my deep round back,
with my body still learning
to open.
The rain keeps
inconsistent time
on the windshield.
It is not deliberately
that the world
throws rocks
in the road.
Or is it?
The dark is only
the dark.
I feel a lessening
of the tension,
a tuning,
and who is it
that pulls
the strings.
Because You Were Taking a Shortcut
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged poem, poetry, shortcut, surrender on September 23, 2017| 1 Comment »
Surrender is not like this highway
with its dotted lines and passing lanes
and its well-marked exit signs.
Surrender is more a dirt country road
where you’ve taken a turn
that doesn’t show up in the map.
And then run out of gas. And
get a flat. And then, when you think
it can’t get worse, you start
to giggle, then full belly laugh.
Yeah, surrender is something like that.
One for the Mind
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged direction, poem, poetry, surrender on August 29, 2017| Leave a Comment »
One Afternoon
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged monsoon, poem, poetry, surrender on August 19, 2017| Leave a Comment »
Here is his ferocity—
how it opens him like a monsoon
here is your umbrella
fling it in the rain
let the flood rearrange you
Even Though It Seems Impossible
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged love, parenting, poem, poetry, surrender on August 7, 2017| Leave a Comment »
I tell myself this is how love begins,
with a grumble. A rock in the shoe.
The flowers dead. Sleet.
This is how love begins, with taunting.
With mud on its feet. It begins
when we can’t imagine loving.
It begins when there is no light.
This is how love begins. When
we’re too exhausted to fight,
and as we slump, a door appears,
and we can’t imagine not
walking through it.
One Acceptance
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged acceptance, letting go, poem, poetry, surrender on May 10, 2017| 5 Comments »
unable to hold things together
I open my hands, let everything drop
and feel how the world holds me
Driving to Work on a Monday
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, poem, poetry, proof, surrender on May 2, 2017| Leave a Comment »
Beside the highway,
the willows are beginning
to find their green
and the dandelions
have begun to spell
their golden praise
across the ground.
What more did I think
I needed today?
Some proof that things
do not fall apart?
Let me surrender
to beauty, brief
as it is, the melody
that plays beneath
all other melodies.
One Unlearning
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged poem, poetry, surrender, voice on April 23, 2017| Leave a Comment »
In My Lucid Hours
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged monostitch, poem, poetry, revelation, surrender on January 18, 2017| 2 Comments »
All these days trying to turn a stone into a song, such relief, its splash in the river
Stages of Grief
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged grief, poem, poetry, story, surrender on August 8, 2016| 4 Comments »
We sat in the round
and rubbed our stories
like prayer beads that
we’ve kept,
but one man let
the world erode him—
so naked, so sacred
he wept.
Yeah, It’s a Metaphor, But Still
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged love, poem, poetry, surrender on June 9, 2016| 1 Comment »
Even now,
as you hang
over the edge
of a cliff,
one hand dangling
empty
above the sheer
chasm,
the other
holding
a thin
brittle
branch,
isn’t it
oddly
wonderful
the only
thought
that hasn’t
fled in fear
is that
this, too,
would be
a great time
for kissing.
Put Your Hands in the Air
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged poem, poetry, surrender on June 4, 2016| 1 Comment »
yeah, your thought bubble
bursts and your scoreboard of hope
falls down in the end zone—
sometimes it’s just so easy to see
it’s all carnival ride from here, baby
One Casting
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged fool, love, poem, poetry, surrender on March 24, 2016| 2 Comments »
I must be a fool missing this life, if I don’t cast my mind in the fire of love.
—Rumi
the flames, they wink,
though there’s no need to seduce—
this body ablaze throws my mind in
Learning to Bow
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bow, poem, poetry, surrender on March 12, 2016| 5 Comments »
I think the invitation is to bow, I said.
I was, of course, thinking only metaphor.
But the next day I found myself
in bowing class—a well lit room
with a maple floor. The teacher
had an accent and I knew
that she meant business.
We bowed to the center, bowed
to the side, bowed with our heads
and our backs and our ribs,
bowed from standing, bowed
while seated, bowed on our knees
and bowed on our bellies. Every cell of me
bowed and bowed and bowed
and bowed until I puddled
on the floor. Today, every muscle
aches with the memory of bowing.
Some voice says to me, there has
to be another way. And another voice
says, oh darling, can you bow
to the ache? Here, I will show you how.
Two Persistences
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged persistence, poem, poetry, surrender on February 27, 2016| 3 Comments »
all day
tugging on my sleeve—
this kiss
*
that inner monologue—
letting it sing
till it loses its voice
At First It Seemed Like a Problem
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged poem, poetry, problem, surrender, what does life want? on February 25, 2016| 3 Comments »
It was so lovely, the home
I built in the arroyo,
such smooth golden plaster
I worked with my hands,
such luster in the wood.
I had been told, of course,
about the chance of flood. Perhaps
some part of me felt relief
when the current finally came—
first a hum, then a roar,
then the splintering din,
and then only vehement rush.
What does the soul want, really,
but to join with the wild flood?
Regret can only tread for so long;
this now is what life wants.
An uprooted tree, a hand carved beam—
both serve as well for a float.
Now whatever the water says,
that is where I go.
Two Surrenders
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged poem, poetry, surrender, tulip on January 18, 2016| 2 Comments »
One Path Toward Happiness
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged happiness, poem, poetry, rain, surrender on October 26, 2015| 1 Comment »
For all my talk of surrender
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged desire, humanness, longing, poem, poetry, surrender on March 15, 2015| 1 Comment »
and saying yes to the world as it is,
my body craves what it craves.
Oh this terrible, beautiful bright stitch of longing
sewn into my breath
with red, red thread,
it pulls, tighter and tighter,
then catches on something
deep in my core,
and some voice,
is it mine? insists,
more, more, I want more.