At just the right moment, to my surprise
you are sitting to my side, and watching intently
as the man says all the things, so very true,
coming through the screen that connects me
to the larger world.
Your left hand reaches out and covers my right
I can see and feel your hand
even through your death.
I didn’t know this was possible
and yet
it was the most familiar, natural thing
like water running through the rocks-
He was telling a story of an unwanted birth
and how the child became
like a black hole
needing to take the light of others
as she was never acknowledged in her own.
It was your true story
and you showed up to hear it.
It made me cry.
I wish it had been different for you.
Now you have gone back to
where-ever it is that you are, these days
I still feel your hand
I wonder
will I ever know that kind of touch again-
is that even possible?
A lifetime of being seed from seed
having known your heartbeat before
you birthed me free
the incredible weight of being
and the joy, too-
the curiosity and wonder,
all in that brief touch.
Perhaps you will pay me
another visit, sometime.
you are welcome to do so-
anywhere in time and space
I will know your touch
and accept it
there are no words needed really
as that moment says it all
and then I will be here again
as is always the case
alone and full
like the sky at night
waiting to see who
comes calling-
Nov 7, 2020
Nov 7, 2020 at 1:01 AM UTC
If you came home, every night
with the smell of oil paints wrapped up in your hair
and turpentine
and linseed linseed linseed oil
I would never have to move again
transported
to the place where it all begins
I don’t need to see
what you’ve created
I already know it,
I see the sparks jump from
tree to tree
this is how the world is set on fire
looking down into my palms
there is a glow
that I had forgotten about
until you brought your smell
into my home
led on by this
against the vale of shade
one person sees and says:
good luck with that! you’ll be eaten alive!
Who do you think you’re kidding?
The next one says:
we are born to suffer, born to die
the ocean wave is just too large
swim brave swimmer, and I feel for you
but against this tide there is no
homecoming to be had-
and the last one sees
the glowing shine of my outstretched hands
making my face an open book
showing just one step or two, and no more than that,
and says:
Is this Light? It must be Light!
The Darkness was a lie after all!
She shrugs her way out
from beneath the oldest cloak
she opens the gate
that doesn’t shut again
and looking down
her hands come to life and light her eyes
jumping quickly tree to tree
unnoticed by most, beneath their load
the spark runs fast
and you hear laughter
as against all habit
the sleepy world is set on fire again
Oct 27, 2019
Oct 27, 2019 at 1:31 PM UTC
In the very moment of committing
in the beginning of her dive
she whips the curtain away for
just a moment
and the vast huge
chasm filled with golden light
shoots out
and everything I have ever known
is reduced to the moment
where I am drawing breath
but had to stop-
we rarely get to see something
so very sudden
so very beautiful
the entirety of things
encapsulated in this
dear old woman’s glance.
She time travels
the lark is on her shoulder
Alberta is just outside
the voices of schoolmates still ring
and we are so blessed to have
the eager ears of
all the children that
have ever been.
Nov 11, 2018
Nov 11, 2018 at 9:13 PM UTC
and out of the very
corner of her aging eye
a younger ****
from far away
makes an overture of unknown nature
the novelty alone stops the bus
and all the old women on board
clutch their large handbags
close to their sides and say aloud:
what does this mean?
maybe nothing at all
maybe just what it looks like
maybe it is the Universe come calling
placing a new plate of wets in a new location
in a new form on a new platter
soon, her nose will take over
and she will know to eat or not
and what to think about it all
there isn't really anything to fear
the bus is still moving in the right direction
how could it not, as beautiful as it is
stop now and then
and garner new riders
the ones that see the color
and hear the music
and how is there not
a rightful place for one and all?
that is a given.
there is no problem
it is love itself
dancing through the mirror or self to self
and in the end
nothing at all but
a blessing
Nov 10, 2018
Nov 10, 2018 at 12:26 PM UTC
My sister had a very
disappointing relationship
with our father
growing up
and always
she got her wings
as part of a rather large
tribe that know this song
and has done her very best
to carry on being
disappointed with men
along the way-
ALL MEN ARE THE SAME
she has said to me
I’m not remotely like
the characters she rails against
and I tell her so.
it just happens that
the ones she finds
sure seem to be that way-
I have to give her mad props
for her picker:
exquisitely fine tuned.
She gives me **** about
my stuff too, as she should
calls deep into my darkness
to the lie that I have grown to believe
the one that has led me to adopt
the dance of the meadowlark
so long that I have forgotten it
was a tool, a ruse,
a survival technique and not
really who I am
dancing in a pointless circle
with a wing that appears to be broken
luring no one in particular
away from the meat and substance
the overflowing bleeding heart
the tears and mostly the rage
and fire
and creativity
that is really me.
We are old now
and apparently successful in our delusions
but not really quite so
because we were born to be just smart
enough
to nibble away at the edges
and want to put on the shining suit
of light
with wings that really work
with eyes that choose to see
with hands that will touch
everything, all at once
and rejoice
now it is time to eat lunch
I wonder what she is up to
there are small things I must be about
and in the background
unavoidable
and yearning
the open blackness that means
another dimension is nearly here
waiting to be born
Nov 5, 2018
Nov 5, 2018 at 3:46 PM UTC
We have our third talk in the month
and I tread clearly, carefully lifting
and placing each statement
and each assumption
still, I am covered in filth
I wonder if this will feel
clean again
you’ve been separated from
your wife of 35 years
for almost two years now?
You never mentioned that:
yes, I never wanted to tell you.
you’ve been to jail
and your story doesn’t really add up
you’ve lost your mind
in bits and pieces
I called you back to shore
but still
you make me afraid to breathe
no wonder she left you
at 3am while you slept deeply
no wonder she just left
a short note on the door
there is too much denial here
too much control
too much shame
I am so sorry for you both
humanity is such a bore
a chore
and so very painful
in all the smallest details
is it a sorrow that a ridiculous habit
is shattered after
an entire adult life has been spent
pretending it was real?
In the end, I don’t think so
but then, I don’t have to hold
that note in my hand
and I don’t have to give up my house
and I don’t have to look in the mirror
or see her face in the eyes of my children
I am mostly stunned
given where you come from
that you missed the lesson on trying
to live the truth
now you have bound me not to tell
others that know you
now I am complicit in this small lie
it makes me feel ill
too sick to even overeat
and that’s saying a lot
and I love you still
and know you are but
a person
and I have read of this
and heard it all before
just not so very close to home or
rather
not so very steeped in my own
assumptions
so the lesson is mine:
wake the **** up and
own THIS feeling
and learn to never ever
close your eyes again
Oct 13, 2018
Oct 13, 2018 at 2:08 AM UTC
your efforts are heard: savor it.
living alone is a choice...there are empty parts
a lack of other(s)
I feel it often.
I have become accustomed, oddly enough-
to being solo.
not anything that I had imagined for myself:
an adaptation to rejection.
successful, but not to my
personality.
it is part of who I am.
I am stunned by expectations I hear about.
I do not have these sorts of problems.
this is part of my efforts of self care.
there is a lot of leaking that goes on
I have to bolster my own light within.
the heart lives, by breaking over
and over.
I like to read about sensitive people
who relate to their plants-
how do they manage?
I could have asked my family
but they are dead
as you know.
I am happy to encourage generosity
but there is no reason
to cling to expectations
I would rather make stuff
or write
to take care of animals
and stuff.
I would rather do this than chase
people around to be my friend
I guess
I am getting old now-
I would just sit
and not say a word:
what else can be said?
Oct 12, 2018
Oct 12, 2018 at 12:06 PM UTC
how could I make up
for all your years alone in the
dried up, haunted orchard?
I have made my own small garden
and the cats sit in the dirt
on balmy summer nights and sing
their song that they made
when the world was young
I will share with you the part
that can be yours
I will give to you
a place that you
might rest and sing, too
if you will lift your voice
away from lamentation
can you feel that the very Earth
has come alive again?
the rushing home of all your appetite
has blurred the lens, for just a moment
believe in this, it is real
pace yourself
your soul, your pain, your joy
your wanting, and then
all the receiving, too
your kindness washes over me
and heals the rooms I had walled
away
for all my talk there are places
I assumed Spring would never come again
thank you for being a light to show
that the doorway has always been open
take my hand that
we may wander together
along the path, where
we have never been
all I ask
is to remain whole
and that you will bring your
whole self with you when we meet
I simply
cannot pretend any longer.
either I am enough, in this life
or I am not.
everything else is a lie
tattered in the wind
and falling away
no hands could scoop it up and make
the pretty mask again
and I am too tired to even try
the last packed bag
in her hand
the door made the smallest sound
as she clicked it closed
no one was awake to hear
no one ever would
the car was waiting
and light was just filling the sky
the shadow stood behind her
and then was gone
tap your heels three times
no matter what they say
tap your heels
and wish yourself home
the magic has begun
Oct 5, 2018
Oct 5, 2018 at 11:28 AM UTC
When I was 23, upstairs in the house
on the busy street
I went to bed and had a dream.
I was in my own bed, in my dream
and a man came into the room
older than me, but not by much
he was nice looking, and had a brown beard
and hair-
get up- he said-
I am a projection here and it
takes too much energy for me to stay long
I got out of bed, amazed.
you must learn to put your problems
into your dream state
and work them out there, he told me
and then they will resolve in waking life
and he was gone.
I stripped and remade the bed, repeating
his instructions to myself, out loud
and telling myself that I could do this, I really could
it was known to me too, that if he was a projection
in my world, then very likely
I was a projection too, of one sort or another.
this is the most clearly overt the dream people
have ever been
though they are rarely out of touch-
they come to take me on the Endless Journey
night after night and show me things
that riddle like poetry
and fill up all the following days
as I try to see through the vastness
of the weaving that is this life
this 3-d printout of the spiritual song
and find my place in it.
I try, in part, because it is that which I must do
and I try, in part, to counter the gnawing
groundlessness that eats me alive every morning
when I awake, in sadness and fear
what a funny tact to use
to try to find grounding in the most
groundless and limitless space there is
the eternal world of dreams
from which everything flows.
it’s all that I know
it is the tool set given to me-
along with the urge to ask questions
to talk to trees and animals
to feel the lift and fall of the wind at night
and to stand calling, with no sound
when the moon shows her face
in that moment that the world calls back
you will never hear from me again
there won’t be a need
I’ll be everywhere, with the dream people
making the rounds
and taking the likely culprits
on a journey that never ends
Aug 8, 2018
Aug 8, 2018 at 11:14 AM UTC
To the heart on fire
everything is tinder
no matter the guise it wears
tender in the rain
tender in the night
tender in the light of dawn
he comes up to me
and his face is alight
rolling like a ship at sea
slowed but not stopped by
a history and pain that does not
really intrude on our meeting.
My friend! My friend! He calls- how are you?
I sit on my stool, I have my tea!
I have these beautiful hills to keep me company
and I watch all the peoples as they go by-
I am a lucky man.
God loves us: god loves us-
this said with no preamble
and his eyes are mine for a moment and
of course I agree
as it is only the truth of every breath.
God loves his faithful servants; his good people;
he blesses us with life- what more could I want?
The car is full of gas now, and he shuts off the pump.
Asks if I would like my receipt, a proof
that he and I were here, together:
yes, I would, if you don’t mind-
of course, habibi, he says, quietly, and rolls
through the unseen waves of his being to the office and
back again.
And I am gone and somewhere else. But the flower
is still unfolding,
the fire that began has grown larger, even now-
and God speaks to me, through an old man on the hill
in his broken English
and calls me His own.
Aug 1, 2018
Aug 1, 2018 at 1:40 AM UTC