for Karen, Lindsay, Sarah, and the other Rangers and Volunteers in Tuolomne Meadows
Marcelo says he’s interested in fasteners,
in nails. He likes thinking about how things
hold together. He’s a carpenter and a poet,
and it follows, his fascination with structure.
Because I am me, I think about love.
I think of the ranger station I saw at Yosemite,
the roof collapsed by heavy snows. I think
of the heap of picnic tables I saw,
metal legs twisted like pipe cleaners,
unable to hold up the weight of long winter.
Things fall apart. And yet.
I think of the rangers who love this place,
who return every year to shovel, to teach,
to clean, to rebuild, to organize, to guide—
their devotion essential as any screws,
as any glue, as mighty as high alpine weather.
Love, the force resilient enough
as the world falls apart
to hold what’s been broken together.
Posts Tagged ‘winter’
What Holds Things Together
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged entropy, love, rangers, winter, yosemite on August 21, 2023| 10 Comments »
Traveling to Scandinavia in Spring
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Scandinavia, spring, travel, winter on April 17, 2023| 3 Comments »
After the long winter,
we choose to travel north,
choose to move deeper into winter
to wander fjords and cobblestones.
We choose again the gray,
the ice, the snow, the cold.
Now I know there is something freeing
about choosing to explore
what isn’t easy.
There’s release, somehow,
in being on the path less warm
when it’s a path
I feel I’ve selected.
So I don again the coat,
the hat, the down.
I wander the streets
with their chill winds
and think, I want to be here.
And it’s true.
There is joy then,
in the bite, though some days
it goes deep.
Joy in being so present
in winter I forget
I could choose something else.
Then I Stood There a Long Time
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged acceptance, failure, falling, let x equal x, standing, winter on March 10, 2023| 11 Comments »
Sometimes I need only to stand wherever I am to be blessed.
—Mary Oliver, “It Was Early”
There is no lovely way to put this.
It was sleeting. I am not going to tell you
how the gray sky unfolded like a somber rose,
how the misty air softened every dark
and barren thing. It was sleeting.
And slick. And when I fell, it hurt.
A lot. But I got up. I got up.
Tobogganing with My Teenage Daughter
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged daughter, mother, play, slow, snow, speed, time, winter on February 24, 2023| 7 Comments »
Perhaps I wish for something dangerous—
a rush, a breakneck ride, a snow-drunk risk.
Instead, my daughter and I slide the toboggan
down the drive with a languid, slow-motion
sluggishness. And we laugh as we urge
the wooden sled forward, creeping
down the hill. After a few laps, the run
is fast enough we can build a small jump
at the bottom, but it’s more of a bump
than a launch. What is it in the heart
that loves a surge, a swell of excitement,
a dance with danger? Why is it fun
to be out of control when the stakes are low?
Oh, my girl and I know, we know what it’s like
when the stakes are high. No wonder
we laugh as we slide at the pace of a stroll.
We know what it’s like to be out of control.
We know. I hold her by the waist as we barely move.
And part of me longs for speed. And part of me
is grateful to move in a way that lets me hold her
a little bit, even just a few seconds, longer.
That Time
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged challenge, snow, storm, winter on February 21, 2023| 11 Comments »
It was like driving through a winter storm
for years, day after week after month
after night after morning of white-knuckled,
stiff-shouldered worry. No tracks to follow,
no sign of a centerline, no rails on the edge,
and where are the snowplows, and what
good is a map when you can’t read the signs?
There were whole months of white out, driving snow-blind
and slow, whole seasons of running the wipers on high
in an attempt to see just one inch further.
It was icy roads, skidding with the baby in back.
It was wishing I could ask someone else
to take the wheel. It was frozen-slick and slippery
with no studded snows. It was sliding with no brakes.
It was what I woke to everyday
and what I dreamed at night.
If there was beauty, I was too afraid to see it.
I wish I could tell you I was brave.
It was slow to change,
like a spring that arrives only to leave again.
One day the drifts were gone and the roads
were dry and the sky was wide blue and clear.
But it wasn’t like snow, was it?
Some things don’t just melt away.
Some storms transform the landscape forever.
Some storms transform the driver.
Starlings in Winter
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birds, friendship, skiing, starlings, winter on January 22, 2023| 4 Comments »
for Christie
Deep in the snowy woods,
we startle at the sound
of starlings as they braid
above the branches.
How often do I miss
the song of the moment?
But today, beside you
I could not miss
the sweet shushing of skis,
the sacred huff of breath,
the lyric of our laughter
and the strong refrain of my heart
as it wheeled like a starling,
a wild and soaring thing
drawn to fly with others,
ready to sing for no reason
except the joy of singing.
In the Second Week of the New Year
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged gardening, healing, planting, winter on January 18, 2023| 8 Comments »
Outside it’s a blizzard,
Inside, I plant seeds
for six heads of lettuce.
I plant cherry tomatoes, yellow,
and tiny seeds of basil.
I plug in the grow lights,
add water, wait.
I’m well aware
how much growth can happen
in the most unfavorable seasons,
how sometimes when the world
feels cruel, we might yet be met
with light, warmth, care.
It brings me real joy
to plant these seeds today
while outside the wind
and snow and cold
do their wintery work.
In a week, there will be sprouts.
In a month, there will be greens.
Though they will be bitter,
they’ll be tender.
I will savor them.
I will share.
How I Made It Across the State
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged driving, romance, winter on December 3, 2022| 6 Comments »
Through sleet, then slush,
through blizzard and ice,
I drove mountain passes
and listened to a love story—
and as my hands gripped
and my shoulders tensed,
my heart cheered for forgiveness.
And as snow fell
and SUVS flipped
and semis slid,
love put its hand
on my hand on the wheel
and though it did not promise me
my own happy ending,
it did crook its finger as if to say
just one more mile, sweetheart,
in the dark current
of the world,
now one more,
now one more,
now one more.
News of the War
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged driving, ice, news, ukraine, war, winter on February 25, 2022| 7 Comments »
The newscaster speaks
and beneath you
the floor becomes ice
and the world
is speeding
on balding tires
and the moment
is the highway
and all is fishtail
and the brakes
are useless now—
and the cliff so close
and you brace
against nothing
and the only way
to correct a slide
is to turn
into the slide—