22 Friday Aug 2025
Searching for words is seeking water
mid-mesa.
Not a tree in sight.
Blessed sage basks in full sun.
Rain falls, drifts away.
Soon tarantulas will promenade,
romancing their coupling dance
to create the next generation.
No, the words are water
and the Maker decides when and how
they drift or drive or well up
through this hollow reed.
Let syllables drip from the tongue unsought,
honey for those hungry
and in need of that particular soul balm.
18 Thursday May 2023
She sits in her corner, turning page
after paper page…
Held by two walls, floor and wood ceiling,
she removes herself
from still more broken connection.
Out there, nothing but loss.
In here, with pictures and stories, friends and
a giving, participatory world.
With father gone for work, back for dinner,
home only for irritation, judgment and sleep,
With mother avoiding pain through worry,
busyness and food,
anger unthinkable,
The girl is left knowing–
beyond the material,
she’s on her own.
Books act as balm
until, later, distance and exploration
return her to the early grief
of being alone
surrounded by people.
The nectar soothes her broken heart,
tear by reclaimed tear.
31 Sunday Oct 2021
I keep checking for messages.
They aren’t there, of course.
What sends messages these days
doesn’t use the language I grew up learning.
How many languages don’t we speak because of those
we had to,
pinning words down with force for
efficiency
exactness
precision
accuracy
literalness lopping off the Song of the universe?
There is light, instead, what trees eat,
reflecting on the full belly of blood-red
garden pot,
and wind talking the leaves high,
high up the towering eucalyptus.
Clapping faeries have flitting epochs to share,
and they await those willing to listen
to languages bodies understand.
More quiet than I yet can hold
is the ear that can translate for me.
God, I know what I would like to be
in service to what is far greater~
please, show the winding way…
11 Sunday Jul 2021
When you think you are failed,
a shameful gash of a human,
misdirected, twenty years off course
and without a single storyline resembling your own
to take to your dreams, to warm a milk of recognition,
read a poem aloud to the trees.
They lean in, I swear it.
And when waters rise to your eyes
maybe your throat catches on memory
and disorientation fogs your vision,
pick up a stone, full with its permission,
and ask if it would like you to feed it the tears.
Springs of salty waters rainbowed with cares
are precious,
not to be wasted on regret.
There’s a much bigger world beyond the fears
binding you to confusion.
Cry a while with sweet words forming upon moving lips.
Walking a path others have not will wipe you out,
no need for surprise there.
It will also leave you, eventually,
soulfully
in the welcoming arms of Spirit.
And isn’t that always where you’ve wanted to be?
18 Wednesday Nov 2020
Ever
read a book
and find yourself
stroking the page while tears drop,
uttering, “God, I love you,”
and wanting to wrap that author up in your arms
to say,
Thanks?
Today is like that.
Not sure how it is to relate with actual humans
but books,
books do walk along beside
between the breathing, the hefting, the washing
and all
the
rest.
27 Sunday May 2018
Dancer
unable to dance,
Writer
without words,
Climber
minus a mountain,
What now?
Not grasping for known
while Unknown is your becoming
means finding,
and learning
a whole new way to move.
Wiggle a little,
court the formless
in this precious release
of who you believe yourself
to be.
15 Tuesday May 2018
A kitten knocks at the door.
In truth, a word behaving like a kitten,
soft, sweet, riled
from chasing a baby squirrel along the avenue.
Baby tore across the asphalt, tail barking,
no visible sign of what gave chase.
Course, words are like that,
and now one has followed me home.
A fur-lined nook between the armrest and my hip
awaits her.
Curious what mischief we can achieve today.
But first,
a short nap.
26 Friday Jan 2018
To what cost,
this silence?
Protecting normal, the naked Emperor,
who rots your bones of its mineral support,
your heart of its song,
your pelvis of its dancing motion,
your mouth of its natural speech.
Stop pretending.
And, with it, generations of loss.
Open the vault.
You may find yourself alone.
But the outcome
will be possession of your own soul.
18 Thursday Jan 2018
A woman reading across the room,
and her soft arc of hmmm at words eliciting her song,
calls forth the bigger music of the library-
four blocks away, a sacred monolith of imagination.
“Libraries for All” declares a sign on the wall.
Yes, except for the drunks,
spoke a woman at the counter-
the police were just here.
I’m sure you see it all, I responded,
libraries are havens for the homeless.
Yes.
Warm. Dry. Open, lit, and cushioned.
Rest your weary bones. Pick up a book,
a newspaper, an image-heavy magazine.
This roof shelters whoever enters.
With or without the fortune or choice
of a place called home,
just best not to betray how many pints
are helping get you through the grey day.
Read on…
Salt, Smoke, Water and Stone 