14 Thursday Nov 2024
I see her, red hair aflame,
paint flying.
Swaths of blackest black,
gashes of scarlet–
blood, bone, ash, scorch,
ochre of marrow.
Enough words, make image.
Shock the system with truth,
Pandora’s box wide,
coffins nesting
and thrown open, skulls screaming out,
souls of generation upon generation of women:
This will not stand.
This will not stand.
No!
15 Friday Mar 2024
You lose your beauty
and the sky turns pink.
It’s not yours to lose.
What twists us in knots
keeps us,
an unholy marriage,
from the divinity shining
within our own eyes.
Who says what is beautiful,
he, she or he?
Meaningless judgments aimed
at raising one, at undermining another.
Recall the kindleless fire
and your heart will know none
but love threading song.
06 Saturday Mar 2021
If your animal rhythm is faltering,
light the flame.
Light the flame at the altar.
Allow Her pulse to fish swim and bloom
back into skin, through muscle,
through lung;
that fur rises, ripples, musky and thick.
She contours your breath when breathing
can be forgotten.
Light the flame
sit
sniff;
Her rhythm returns to guide
along paths stony, unmarked
and yours,
to wander and learn
alone.
08 Wednesday Aug 2018
August,
the light casts red.
Dry season wilt and crunch, yellow
becoming brown,
and hungry fires chew acres
to miles
of hillside and range.
Fire’s satiation point moves further out
each passing year
as our own deafness to species and spaces
beyond our own grows.
Dim the constant noise of phone, computer,
bottom line, app and sale-
play a role smarter than consumer-
and how life continues from here may
be more inclusive, open, mindful
and naturally sweet.
The fires have much to say.
23 Wednesday May 2018
The basements, bathrooms, shrouded corners,
narrow, black to seem endless, alleys,
the Do-Not-Enters,
these are the intended places.
Go to them.
What courage lies docile and low
will rise up, a fire, a wave, a mountain
to have your back even as growing fear
dissolves
what you think holds you together.
17 Saturday Mar 2018
Grabbing at her skirts with reaching manly hands
uninvited
toward a desired body-
not hers (the particular) but any-
that flipped the switch, dramatically,
from her naive Oh I’m Wanted
to the real He Thinks He Can Take Whatever He Wants,
and she wheels around, out of his greedy, cruel grip
leaps out the window onto a roofline she knows like a cat
and stops doubting her worth, while learning
to doubt his,
and smiles with bare feet hugging the tile crest
of a building she’s perfectly willing to leave, bearing
a trail of grief so light it brings only
a rush of relief.
08 Wednesday Mar 2017
I always entered and
exited
through side doors.
quietly.
..slipping in or out with as few eyes following
or ears noticing
or minds rippling
as possible.
Now,
however,
that I’ve bought my freedom
I will be using the front door
as often
as loudly
as visibly
as this once-silent spirit
needs be.
And some houses will never
be catching sight of me
again.
02 Thursday Feb 2017
Somebody’s got their hands in the cookie jar
to take every last one.
And ain’t nobody having it.
Because it goes like this~
One for you, and for you, and for you and you and you.
Anybody missed?
Oh yes, please join us,
your stories are encouraged.
Here, warm your toes
by this joyous, abundant fire.
31 Tuesday Jan 2017
Eyes heavy from reading news,
a seemingly apocalyptic caravan of events
and, yet, spirited fires light here, there, and there-
in me, in you, over the next hill where soft glow flickers.
Hours on the phone, speaking up, speaking out, thanking,
and yet another heart lifts during great challenge.
Tend to that fire consistently,
have water always near to temper and moisten,
eat of earthen foods to slow, slow
into the long journey ahead.
All are precious in this global transformation,
take another’s hand in yours in pure reminder.
28 Sunday Aug 2016
Being sculpted
means
being thrown,
as clay,
first kneaded- no bubbles – then
spun
well beyond dizzy,
cut,
and fired to degrees
scorching
even by shuddering imagination
if
your aim is to be a
cup,
vase,
bowl,
holy space ripe
for filling,
able to offer solace, pleasure,
delight,
beauty, compassion,
ease,
and round reflections of sky.
Don’t hold on.
Be here.
Salt, Smoke, Water and Stone 