around my heart has come down.
Oh sure, I’ve rebuilt them with stones
of indifference. Stones of distraction.
Stones of unwillingness to see and be seen.
I’ve rebuilt the fortresses again. Again.
But then come flames of heartbreak.
Cannons of loss. The triple promises
of entropy, gravity and time. And at last,
too exhausted to lift the stones again,
I shiver with the cold wind of fear.
Sting from the sharp blades of betrayal.
But I feel, too, the gentle hand of another
as it holds my trembling hand.
Feel the body soften as I listen
to the music I could never make alone.
How present I can be when I no longer try
to rebuild the fortress. Present
enough to listen for the goodness
in the hearts of others. Present enough
to listen for the goodness in mine.
Posts Tagged ‘vulnerability’
Every fortress I have ever built
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged fear, fortress, self-protection, vulnerability on February 12, 2026| 4 Comments »
The Layers
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged compassion, cottonwood, layers, self-protection, tree, vulnerability on December 6, 2025| 6 Comments »
Furrowed and runnelled and rough,
the gnarled bark of this old cottonwood.
The dead thickness protects living tissue
from cold, from wind, from flames.
I, too, am older, but somehow survival
shows up for me the opposite.
Any shields I would build up as barriers—
life keeps peeling them away.
What thickens around me now are layers
of dynamic compassion—vital, vulnerable,
ever-growing. They do not protect
against wounds. Instead, they seem to say,
Be with what aches, my dear. Trusting
discomfort is the only way.
This moment I want to remember,
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bathing, friendship, joy, seeing, vulnerability on April 29, 2025| 4 Comments »
when my friend filled the giant
white stone resin tub with great mounds
of frothy eucalyptus lemon
scented bubbles and water as hot
as she could stand and I walked in
to find her laughing, laughing!
head thrown back and eyes alive
with her great luck to find herself
here “in a millionaire’s bathtub,”
her giddy giggles ricocheting
around the tiled room, radiating
gladness and naked joy, and though
only her head was visible above the bubbles,
I saw her, really saw her as herself,
the uncurated version—that glorious
creature we so seldom chance to glimpse
in each other. As I walked away, her voice
followed me up the stairs, full-throated
and citrus bright as she sang out
her bliss, the words indecipherable,
the tune a tune I’d never heard before
but somehow knew by heart.
To the Bunny Who Lives Under the Porch
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bunny, elegy, fear, spring, vulnerability on March 9, 2025| 8 Comments »
Snug little lump of timid flesh
whose fur matches the brown
grass of late winter, silent
little being with your long
pointy ears twisted back,
oh, soft little wide-eyed prey,
thank you for returning
to the yard this morning.
After two weeks of not seeing
your fidgety-whiskered nose,
I met your apparent loss like an elegy
I didn’t want to write. I am tired
of writing elegies, though this
is what life asks us to do—
to meet the world of loss
and learn the beauty
that grows from it.
So imagine my joy today when
I was driving in a faraway town
and my husband sent me a photo
of your mild, quiet bunny-ness
nibbling grass beside the porch,
one shiny brown eye open
to the camera. A wild gratefulness
for life flooded me then, keen
as a pasqueflower, bright
as a globe willow greening
on the winter side of spring;
and my heart leapt out
from beneath its shelf of fear,
vulnerable as you, little bunny.
Thank You Letter to My Heart
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged gratefulness, heart, open, vulnerability on January 5, 2025| 4 Comments »
Thank you, heart for breaking open
every time you hear of the throbbing
ache of war. The devastation of hunger.
The agony of humans choosing
to hurt each other. May you always break.
May you never grow callous enough
that you listen to news of bombs
and betrayals as if you are listening
to the weather report. Thank you,
heart, for letting yourself be stunned
by joy at the slightest of beauties—
by the stilting gray hop of the bunny,
the pink pucker of grapefruit,
the crimson blush of amaryllis
as the tepals burgeon against the green bud.
Though the mind longs to organize,
you thrive on surprising me. Like the way
you rise up for the same rain I once reviled.
Like the way you crave the silence
that once I feared. Like the ways
you have taught me to love the parts of me
I once thought were unloveable.
For all the times I have forgotten
to say thank you, forgive me.
I am still learning. I will forget how to love,
will forget to thank you again.
But here, on the edge of who I will be,
here I am, open as I know how,
gratefulness growing, pushing
against my own green.
The Unsheathed
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged connection, peach, peaches, tenderness, vulnerability on August 29, 2024| 5 Comments »
Like skinning a peach,
I sometimes want to peel back
the masks of the world and myself
to uncover in each other what is
naked and glistening—
an essential sweetness
that can no longer be contained.
If it is wrong to wish this, I wish
it anyway, wish to meet each other
defenseless, with softness,
so moved by proof of how easily
our flesh is bruised, reminded
how tender with each other we must be.
The Choosing
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged authenticity, connection, daughter, grief, happiness, intimacy, love, mother, vulnerability on May 25, 2024| 10 Comments »
Perhaps I no longer believe in happiness
as the goal. Not that I am against happiness,
but being in this very uncomfortable moment
with little light and a vicious chill, my arms wrapped
around my growing girl, both our hearts breaking
from sorrow and fear, both of us too well aware
of what can be lost, well, I would not trade this moment
for any wide-grinned hour of beach and sun,
wouldn’t rather be anywhere else with anyone—
I would choose again and again to be here
on the dark sidewalk with my girl in my arms,
our hearts so raw, the space between us so warm.
Like the Peony
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged blossom, peony, resilience, vulnerability on February 27, 2024| 12 Comments »
Like the peony that opens
and opens and opens,
this is how I want to meet life—
surviving the cold
then returning to bloom
again. Again.
That vibrant. That many-petaled.
Embarrassingly fulsome,
as if life just can’t
get enough of itself.
Truth is, life cuts you to the ground
and you lose all but the roots.
Sometime you lose those, too.
How is it, then, comes
the chance to bloom again,
to be less master of life,
and more servant to the life
that pushes through.
I want to be fluent in blooming.
I want to trust the possibility
of sweet spring perfume
as much as I trust
the inevitability of frost.
I am so grateful for beauty,
albeit brief,
for the chance to be naked,
tender, soft.
After Talking About Vulnerability
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged certainty, hats, loss, vulnerability on February 25, 2024| 6 Comments »
I just want something
I can hang my hat on, she said.
But the mortarboard didn’t hang on education.
The government’s white wig fell off.
The tiara slipped from beauty.
The skullcap blew off the church.
No hat she hung could stay.
The ball cap fell off the firm body.
Art couldn’t keep the beret.
Even the mesh net
of the beekeeper’s wide brim
fell away, fell away, it all falls away.
Which is to say nothing stays.
Not the dodo. Not the dino.
Not the houses we live in.
Not our firm young skin.
Not a father, not a son.
Not sunshine. Not rain.
Not empires. Not cats.
Not the first crushing fist of heartbreak.
Not nightmares. Not bruises.
Not hats.
She let herself drift
in what was left, her head bare,
hands empty, heart open,
eyes wide. The sun stroked
her shoulder. She breathed in
the musky scent that arrives
on the wind just before spring.
Nothing was certain. She stood alone
at the edge of every possible thing
no hat in hand, and listened
to the chickadee sing.
Perhaps Inevitable
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged ekphrasis, hiding, klimt, mask, revelation, vulnerability on November 5, 2023| 4 Comments »
after Gustav Klimt’s “Tragedie”
even now beneath
the stony gray mask of control
I feel it growing
a shimmering flower of purest gold
the naked truth
*
To sign up for the class that inspired this poem (and yesterday’s, too)–it’s not too late!–see below. Though the three-week class began last Friday, you could watch the recording of the first class and join us for the next two sessions.
Love, Sex, Death and Everything: A Creativity Playshop with Gustav Klimt
Nov. 3, 10, 17, 11a.m. -1 p.m. MST
Three weeks of exploring what lurks in the depths of humanity. Each class consists of a deep Jungian-oriented dive into music and myths behind Klimt’s images led by Kayleen Asbo, interwoven with Rosemerry leading an exploration of mortality, passion, terror and beauty in your own creative writing practice. For more information and to register, visit here.