08 Wednesday Mar 2017
Grass,
green, high, lilting..
Spring wears her tall rubber boots
and wanders through
from seedling to start, from birdsong to unfurling fiddlehead.
Crossing slopes slowly,
around and up,
She eventually meets their tops
having tapped every waking wildflower
with a wink and a sweet how-do-you-do.
Her hair trails behind her in post-storm breeze.
With a softened gaze, you’ll catch a snippet of calico print dress
somehow waving
from a corner of your own sunny imagination.
07 Saturday Jan 2017
Those pesky brains,
the ones making a someone of a something-
who’s been serving them the kool-aid?
Settle them down before we cart them off
wearing special white outfits complete with ties
they can not undo.
We’ve categorized, cauterized, organized, familiarized
until the ize of the horizon is known.
Imagining may be cute when your feet are small
but now we must grow up-
taller, smarter, firmer in stance and action;
Up-standing people further things, uphold things-
We are the Someones of Somethingdom.
Reality has a timeline, afterall.
And, then, while we adhere and cohere
we’ll do something silly like have a child
who will see all we won’t
and giggle until she’s sideways
leaving at least one of us to wonder
just what exactly brings that spark to her eyes
and rolling thunder to her tiny, mirthful belly…
(Go ahead, It says- research that.)
01 Sunday Jan 2017
The new year could be a prism,
a prison,
an ache and an embrace.
We just never know,
until at once a soft wind settles and we do.
Offer a kindly nod to the dark,
and an opening of arms to the light-
both will accompany us the whole way;
it is our work to acknowledge and learn from
the full spectrum every day.
May we remember to create Beauty
and move skillfully as we can
with the cinnamon dance of Mystery..
And, please, mind the tenderness of little toes.
17 Saturday Dec 2016
It wasn’t through torn paper
blackened shoelace
or scuffed wall
that I found You.
It wasn’t the constant push
circulating fear
or I-must-do-betters..
not even the inch between
the sidewalk and me
plus a bruised knee.
Not exactly.
Add the non-starts,
regimented dreams,
what’s-wrong-with-me’s,
attempts to fit when fitting fed starvation,
and the broken heart- birthday after birthday-
with one shattering
nearly beyond recovery
that, finally,
I found You.
The joke being
that I’ve carried You in me
since before the first sunrise.
Except now,
when I say hello
I can hear You answer.
16 Sunday Oct 2016
22 Thursday Sep 2016
Being an untamed tributary
of a river whose origin reaches far
into depths unkown
brings twists of bramble,
leaping fish,
frog and cricket symphonies,
bats dipping low in twilight-
when settling into quiet lulls.
In rugged young churning-
escaping water
pulls earth, boulder, tree to itself
as passion builds with heavy rains,
filling banks,
carving hungry routes,
chewing civilized lands and
renewing plots left withering.
This tributary is this and more,
trading nothing away
in honor of its nature–
wild, strong and unpossessing.
04 Sunday Sep 2016
Love isn’t
always soft
is
untidy
(a raw egg yolk held
in hand)
has sharp edges
– humans dabble –
Love’s a ritual
a practice
a devotion
a learning
an art
Love is difficult
playful
strong
it’ll kick your butt
and
no craft
can possibly
outshine it
13 Saturday Aug 2016
And if the stars are talking to you
through closed sash and latched window?
And if the tree sway would catch you in a dance
were you only to step outside at dawn?
And if the thick green pond might turn blue
if you’d catch its eye while passing by?
And if the coyote call one ridge away
could reach your naked aching ear
were technology not wedged tight,
filling the cracks where nature could get in?
And if the ducks recently born,
hiding beneath the bowering bracken
edging the water
could gather your attention as you do theirs,
would this love affair ripen
and our wild and sacred
no longer be made into amusement parks?
There is a begging for fidelity here-
make this wild love affair true.
It is our one way through.
09 Saturday Jul 2016
Were I to cull a story,
cut off its wings to still its tongue,
would you be any safer from the past?
The chills walking your spine are not
exiting belief but
sashes and
passages of truth.
Words have no allegiance
once the fire is struck,
and winged shadow escapes, up,
out, beyond-
toward a second
a third
an eleventh
pulsing heart
with ears to hear.
Practice your listening-
what you fear most may be
the balm of the deep.
25 Saturday Jun 2016
I have searched, reached,
spoken, cried, and delivered.
My arms have ached in fullness, emptiness
and longing,
my legs have quaked miles into the journey
with nowhere but onward
left to go.
Muscle blood bone
register waking
like petals opening toward light.
What I now carry will remain behind
in this daily offering
of God
back to God.
Salt, Smoke, Water and Stone 