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Posts Tagged ‘waking’

The Grown Daughter

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on June 23, 2023| 7 Comments »


 
Before my eyes are open,
I reach across the bed
to find my mother’s arm
atop the comforter
still heavy with sleep.
I settle my fingers there
like a butterfly landing
on a flower the same color
as its wings. Grateful
for this simple proof
she is here, soft and breathing
beside me, I fall back asleep,
my hand still touching her.
Long after we wake,
I still feel it in my hand,
not her arm itself,
but the reaching.

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Some Mornings

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on June 1, 2023| 6 Comments »

Before the eyes are open
but after the body wakes,
there is that gentle interlude
when the scent of the dream
lingers like lavender incense
and light enters the body
through the skin and there is
enough awareness to fall in love
with this moment but not enough
agency to stay in or to leave—
 
I imagine it’s what it’s like to be a bud,
to remain folded in on the darkling magic
until, like soft petals, the eyelids
can’t help but unfold
and the irises sip at the light
and half of the soul angles back
toward the dreamworld,
the other half opens toward life.

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The Call

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on April 26, 2023| 4 Comments »


 
 
Dawn, and the geese announce
their landing on the pond—
and though the reluctant body says sleep,
the heart rouses to attend their arrival.
So many awakenings seem to happen like this:
when I feel least ready, least willing, most averse,
something demands I rise—
something strident, insistent, wildly alive,
saying, Now! It’s time! You’re here.

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Two Days Before Spring

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on March 19, 2023| 6 Comments »

 
Without knowing it this morning,
I woke to the day
the bluebirds returned.
 
Every morning it is like this—
the chance to rise into a day
of unexpected blessings.
 
All afternoon the bluebirds weave
through the field, perch on the roof,
bob in the grass.
 
I marvel at how easily
beauty slips in to help me
fall in love with not knowing.
 
All day I feel lucky,
like a woman given
a truth so precious
 
not because she deserved it
but because she woke up
and met the day.
 

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Adjusting to the Change

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on November 12, 2021| 8 Comments »




Just today I didn’t make you
a cup of chai—did not stir
in the dark clover honey,
did not warm the soy milk,
did not bring you the cup
with red flowers, the one
we got in Finland all those
years ago when we couldn’t
sleep with all that light—

instead I pour myself
into the black of morning.
There is sweetness here
in these quiet, predawn hours,
a vastness no cup could ever contain.
I want to serve it to you,
though I sense, love,
it is you serving it to me.

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The Waking

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on July 26, 2021| 2 Comments »



When we wake, all people are rivers—
though some are torrents and some
mere trickles, though some break down
obstacles and some slowly meander.  
We move from our beds through the banks
of the world, our lives following the course
of the day. Our streams merge with the streams
of others. We are, every day, more each other
and still somehow ourselves. If only we could trust
our uniting currents as unthinkingly as the rivers
follow gravity—always with the least amount
of resistance. How long will we pretend
we are separate? How long before we find ourselves
joined in the communion of the sea, all our waters
one water, every waking an invitation.

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Making the Most of Peace

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on February 9, 2021| 5 Comments »



Make the most of peace.
            —Holiday Mathis, horoscope February 9, 2021


This morning I wake to notice
that nothing hurts. I notice
I am warm beneath the comforter
and the air in the house is cool on my face
and the only sound is a chickadee at dawn
singing its two-note “sweetie” song.

There are mornings I wake already stunned
by the pain of the broken world,
but this morning, I lie for a while
in quiet and savor the thin trace of first light
as it develops grays in the room, savor
the rhythmic rise and fall of my own chest,
savor the feel of my palm on my belly,
welcome its slight weight, its small warmth.

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