I thought of our drunk nights in L.A.
how without fail we would go to same 24 hour cafe and we always would end buying ourselves and the person asking for a meals outside the place something to munch on.

I thought of you yesterday when I could not pass by a person with a cardboard box and a few won in it, in middle of winter.
“It’s so cold”
I turned back around, and put enough in the box so they could have a meal and cup of coffee.
I know we said long ago we would buy people meals, but he was asleep and I was making my way from Asia park to my home in winter
–both of us were cold

we cradle, what is to come
so let us not hold back our visions
and our kindest of dreams

“Hope”called by many names
is the true muse
–it is the bird in our hands–
a torch passed down on this long and arduous journey

our desire to light the next one
and dispel the cold nights of hate is vehement
we cradle, what is to come

The things we dare to do
are magnificent
as simple and as noble
as opening our hands

risking blistered feet and the very possibility
of being hurled to the cold floor of our own cynicism
but there
where hurt and the outline of despair arise
the sun still seems to make its trajectory across the sky

and although nothing seems in place, the things we dare to do quietly are in awe of us
as we gather all our hanging parts, and lift our heads

Sleep with love in your heart
tomorrow is a new day
rest, close your beautiful eyes

Dear love could you see me with new eyes too
could we clear the slate and I could I love you
as I have always longed to love you
I forgive and I wish to walk down the narrow streets with you

I call a new dynamic into place
a loving
nourishing
appreciating love
that expands because it is fed
who knows of devotion

And wherever it abides
–becomes the very home of love itself
All are welcome to it's cove
to be a good resting place when times are hard
Love that inspires more love

I call a new dynamic into this year
So I turn to myself
And ask " are you ready to be more:
loving
nourishing
and appreciating?”


I smile at my reflection; little lady with some bright dark eyes
I feed my body, sleep and make sure to clear my mind with mediation and prayer
I hold the my limbs in the bathtub and rub them
thank you for walking me down all those roads
New dynamics are here unfolding
opening their hands and gently leading you forth
I try to pay attention to the whispers

I reach like a flower towards the sun
just as I did the first time I opened my eyes

I have not given up on tying to reach
for the rays of sunshine
and the for a loving tomorrow

I love to see how life flourishes
everywhere it finds a way to thrive
I love looking at the same people with new eyes
I love getting older. I love forgiveness and I love that we are all
not the same

I have to sit with all my “I don’t knows” until I know –until a clear answer emerges.

I tried to tell you
I loved you
in all the ways
I could
now it just lingers
on my lips
soundless

Some days I feel you, right in the center of my chest. I do not know how else to describe it.

I look at the trees with reverence; I look at the cats running across the street with eyes of reverence, eyes of reverence behold small  flies but what about the mass of skin and mystery that is me?

I should revere this lifetime, this instrument, this life –anything less is lack of love

For L

You were wild. They were not too keen of wild womyn and less of wild girls. I was rather reserved. Quiet but always strong willed.

If I said I would come, you knew I would show up
And you, your sister and your mother loved me
–and I you

the first time I moved away you came to help me pack
I kept the picture we took on that day  
Your short purple hair and my frizzy locks
Everytime I am home you embrace with so much love I forget time has passed

For KJE
She is wild too. they tell her to love someone else and she says no. While riding her  bike she came to the realization that loving another womyn, and choosing to spend her life with her was testament enough that she was “not so bad”. She could have chose  something easier, something as simple as marrying a man. But she chose to live in the land of the morning calm and ride her bike though mangwon- do with her love

For NL
She is the quiet kind of wild, closer to mine. She does not talk much but she feels the world as if it were an extension of her. Her long golden hair. Her love of animals and her gentleness soften anyone in the vicinity. Countless times I have been in awe of her depth. I swim there with her and she swims there with me. We grow expanding like two foam growing capsule lizards. Who knows how much we will grow but we are willing to find out

For AC
Car rides, records stores and synchronized dancing to “Yo La Tengo” running through sprinklers in the middle of the night
swimming
concerts and sketching, Co-op sandwiches and poetry readings
She call herself a full time goblin. She embraces what others think makes her un lady like and she is not apologetic for being who she is–a force of nature

For DR
You are firm. You are the kind of woman trees envy. The kind that is rooted and grows evermore into her own beauty. When you dance your eyes light up and you giggle and sway your branches.

my sister she carried the light into my hands
with each of her strong unmovable
words

Light of mine
I hold on dearly to you

Metaphorical winters
are worse than any sub zero days

Warmth
glinting of the soul
I embrace you with both my hands
and I give this living all I have got

What gifts can I offer
What can I give
I want to make beauty so that it surrounds the human heart
comforts it and wills it to carry on
What can I offer, I ask again
should I draw a hand or paint a beaming ray of light
Should I sing lullabies back to the night

What questions can I ask
What statements can I make
which requests can I utter
Are
Guide me, grow me, make me forgiving and more gentle
appropriate
Do I need more reverence for life
including my own

I do not like stagnation I like rivers and how they naturally flow
I want to make beauty

We all must grow
and we all need to be challenged
to sit within ourselves and face the fear
face what stands in our way  
towards becoming more loving
and at the same time more authentically ourselves

archive past mistakes
and learn to forgive ourselves
for not being wiser
–wisdom is a gift of time
with every experience carved into us
with every partnerships with friends
family and lovers aimed at the growth of spirit
we heal

everyone shows us we are whole
That divinity is our inheritance as they walk us to the door of our own soul


Nothing, no one, no possession is enough –none will ever be–
because you were born complete

There many rivers to be in awe of
wide,life giving, enough to satiate  

I must look at the rivers near me
and know they are just as healing as any other just as birthing and comforting as my most beloved rivers

How magical is life that I still want to open my palms
breathe the dust, pollen,  

and carry flowers from the fields
to my gentle resting place
How magical that we suffer
but that woe is never us

I am in a field of lilies
collecting flowers–making bundles
I will not come unless I am called

I love you and I want you to flourish
carry that shine in your eyes
I don’t matter how old you are  
smile and feel as light as the day you first entered this world

nine days of prayer
ceaseless for you
as you transmute

“May the light of hope never extinguish” she sent me this and countless other messages right up until two weeks ago. Busy, “ she must be busy” I thought. My first response is always to assume the best.


Her loving arms, that stretched far to hold me with so much warmth. From child to adolescent to adult. I thank her and I grieve her
and I sit
and love her
and I thank her eternally
for helping me see the gentleness that life can always offer
and I grieve our loss
and I love her
and I see her in part of everything I have become

All the Eyes of Eye are walking through the markets
performing a dismounting dance from buses
onto sidewalks
crossing street lights erratically
diagonally tracing their feet over a surface not as impressionable as sand
their gravity given weight: leaving little trace behind

...
The eyes of eye
are born one day, burgeon and transmute
and more eyes open
like lilies replenishing: the eternal spring of consciousness
Each pair of eyes is the Eye
...
It is late now but I have gathered my keys, put on a coat and walked to the corner store to buy Chamomile tea. I close my eyes and feel the cold breeze. One. One other person is walking far off in the distance down the same street as me. I see recognize them and whisper to myself “eyes are I”
...
Her eyes are the same color as mine. You could say she gave them to me–my eyes. I move through the world with them.

It is never ending:
the warble of mystery
and the rebirthing of life
and us with our many eyes.

It is fleeting:
the sky and the leaves
and I.

All my dreams you have expanded
magnificently woven them into something
intricate, breathtaking and unimaginable.
So I  take it, take  it all
all of it

Heart
illuminate my travels
turn my attention towards my emotions
and let them be my map
my mind does not see

We jumped and dodged mops
and chairs around the house so that we could in fact deliver the antidote to our dying playmate on the other side of the house. Then upon our arrival we opened our palms to reveal the loose pills of sweetart rolls that would indeed cure the our peer’s fatal illness as they giggled, and we choose what game we would play next.

I can see myself loving again
I can see myself helping nourish the plants and creatures around me
I can see myself walking in a long dress with flowing hair
with little heads around me peeking into bushes and trying to feel everything in sight
I can see myself singing to my friends
and reading them poetry
sketching the neighbor and feeding the stray animals
I can see dreams being woven inside of more dreams
dreams being expanded and liberated into the hands of the all

I want to stay away
because it find it loving
to get out your way.
Boulders do not move
rarely do any obstacles we face willingly depart
but I am not a rock I am a person and I choose to
get out of your path
so you can get on with your life
and thrive where you see fit
among those you call good company
where things flourish and fly off
from the belly of your joy

The things we dare to do are magnificent no matter
how insignificant they may be to others

As dangerous as walking a long road with the wrongs shoes
and trying to adjust them over and over
as if somehow that will change their material
   their essence
   everything has its own way of being
just because the shoe fits does not mean it can help you make the journey
joy is a compass and you shouldn’t wait until sharp pains
arise over and over

Keep good company
and learn to forgive
surround yourself with loving people
whose eye light up when they see you

who know how to say I am sorry when they have
not listened or have not showed up for you

the company you keep you become
choose wisely
pick those who guide you to the door of your divinity
who can pick you up with as little as their sincere smile
and loving ears who might only be able to listen
but do so with attention
because they see you, they truly see you
and that is a gift

Winter has become the mighty director of direction subverting routes from the longest to shortest
the least exposure is not meticulously planned just arrived at
welcomed almost without a second thought  
the hands in pockets
the way the body shivers and the way it sighs in relief to be inside
to sit on a chair and let the limbs loosen letting tension slide off

I cast my wishes
into the endless fountain of time
and release my palms to the openness of
possibility
to the songs of forgiveness
and the scent of embrace
that binds me to this very living

My left foot steps onto a cloud and then the right foot proceeds
before I know it I am walking celestially
unencumbered
I want to perceive and understand what else is there
What other inner cabinets of aliveness await
the endless curiosity unfurls from my eye
and so I keep hopping
taking step one step at a time
from one cloud to the next

Did you know you glow in magnificence? how you beam and stretch across the darkness just by offering a smile or a warm hello you hold back the night or you deliver me the stars
you see your hands and make them meaningfully toil to get closer to your dreams to get closer to your heart
your divinity and beauty is in no competition with any other womyn
you are calm, sturdy and resilient
you make it out the door with an air of faith and the scent of grace that works through you onto the hands of all who witness you
For all these and more I love you

I refuse to be snarky
to sit in a room and poke fun of others
intentionally
to complain and complain to no end

I refuse to tear people down or roll my eyes at them. I just rather sit quietly and read my book. I want this space of mine to be calm and joyful.

I have the urge to buy a glittery pink jacket and a turquoise hat
wear one personality and then wear the next
loosen up the ego

How little I know is the constant
but I am not frustrated or in denial of that
it is fine by me
kicking off my shoes and resting my back over the bed
feet dangling
knowing zero is less daunting now
always humbling
the traffic off of the main road is muted by the floor heating
my fear tamed by my will
that does not want to let uncertainty climb up
upon me

The hinge that holds the door
does not creak this is evidence enough that I should be grateful

but I take deep breathe and it’s as if I inhale the world pain and so I creak
 even if the hinge on the door does not

The hardest thing by far is
lovingly letting go
I smile and I cry at same time
I am joyful and in sadness simultaneously

My eyes well up and I not sure why anymore

It feels bruised
The area to the right of my heart
towards the middle
almost at the midpoint where my ******* meet
is in pain
but when I look in the mirror
there is no green, purple or yellow
and I wonder if in a few days it will show itself or if it will take years

Are you conscious of the power
your thoughts and words have to create

when you awake dear
do you say thank you, too

do you like excessively warm showers
do your toes turn red as you stand there, too
?

and have you learned to pray even if you do not call it by that name

Do you meditate
do you see divinity in everything
can you see god–the all– in the swaying of the leaves
have I met you

I am here
alive at the same time as you

you can come in dream if you wish

May you wake up and may the sun smile upon you
The are many triumphs that might not seem mighty
but they are
like looking in the mirror and smiling gently at your reflection
putting your palms together and saying “thank you for this new day”

I am inviting all the beautiful
I am inviting all love and serenity
I am inviting hope to walk alongside me
I am inviting unmeasurable light to guide
I am inviting that which brings me true joy

I have decided that in this lifetime I must not give up
I must indeed go further in
wring out the chatter
wring out the events some might deem unfortunate
wring them until life giving water is released
enough to grow beautiful things

If she leaves tonight
the women will begin their circles of prayer and the flowers will arrive
but will not get there in time
so I sit and go within
light up candles and carve an inward path to her
I will be with her to see her through
I will have to dig deeper
for her life gave me life
and we are linked
forevermore