Thirty-nine

There were ghosts in that forest, 

that much I knew.

Spring reveals so much of the dead.

All of those bones: small bodies, intact.

Dead beaver, or muskrat, skulls with their teeth,

red toads leapt out from under our feet.

We were alone, you tried to convince me 

that the sounds that I heard didn't come from a gun, 

just wood being chopped, a mile away;

axe to tree

axe to tree

axe to tree

breath.

A deer can sense a human's presence 

                a mile away.

breathing, is a threat. 

We sat beside the abandoned hunter's cabin 

and watched those magnificent creatures run by.

They were so close, its as if in that moment 

they had forgotten

what it was like to fear.

I swallowed the gin

and passed it to you. 

I tried to relax.

It was my birthday, after all.

I was another year older, 

surrounded by bones

clinging to you, the trees, and my lungs.

I am Quiet

I am quiet.

Still.

Silent.

I am the absence of noise.

I am the listening to,

of life. 

I am the breath of trees, I am 

their creaking solitude.

I am the waves, 

giving up their gentle tide, I am 

the old fingers of wind,

tapping at the door 

with the arrival

of new snow. 

I am the hush of cold,

coming to wrap the city in blankets.

I am the deepest sigh of the woods.

I am the settled household, 

at last.

I am Yellow

Ochre, not the white-blind, shining sun, 

not the smiling-faced flower.

I am yellow ochre pouring in

honey-soft and slow, 

through my living room curtains

at sunset.

In summer, yes

but I am not the bright lights of summer. 

Not the never ending days.

I am the edges of the forest trees in morning

draped in mist and fog.

I am the burnt-orange,

crisped-browns,

the amber-reds of autumn. 

I am the earth, underfoot.

Sunday Morning

There is nothing as honest as this:

a thunderstorm on a Sunday morning in summer.

Strong espresso in bed,

the sound of rain on the attic roof.

The marriage between nature and home, 

the predictable way he tells me

I've left the patio cushions out

let the hot air in, because I wanted to hear the rain.

The smell of potatoes frying on the stove.

We don't have to say,

the things we don't want to say.

Because the honesty of a Sunday morning, is enough.

The Question of What I Am

lays dormant in the softest places of me,

where sleep, like a cat, shows it's exposed underbelly

which is the place my soul will go

garden or churchyard,

flowers or ash

I hold them both close.

the flowers with their muddy roots,

and the bones that make themselves known.

Balloon

I remember the time he said
that when I loved,
it was as if a balloon was filling up inside me.

I could see it clearly then
this balloon,
growing fat in hollow places.

Because he said it,
and because he could see it,
there was a balloon.

Its boundless light in my body,

shining from my eyes,

sending the warm air of celebration

from my mouth.

Mother's Day

Sometimes a daughter
is given to the world, not to be loved alone.
Not to be loved, enough
by one.
By just one woman, alone.
Sometimes a job is too big, for one,
for just one mother, alone.
Sometimes a daughter comes into the world
for the ones who didn't know.

For the ones who didn't know
that she would be theirs, alone

The Body Knows Not What the Earth Knows

The body knows not what the earth knows:

the way it becomes pliant with rain, soft 

as mud underfoot in spring,

or loose as a wind-dance 

in summer.

Neither melting snow or rushing water

is the way of the body.

I am none of these things.

My earth is made of tendons and sinew,

blood, bone

and the lung traps --

where the breath catches itself in braces. 

Each morning 

I wake before dawn, 

muscles of rock resisting

the goodness of sleep, of a bed,

of more dreams.

So with no other choice,

I rise

and I write,

glad for the upright chair made of wood.

Existing Inside a Poem

Sometimes you don't need to write them:

the words that paint the pictures,

or the words that sing the songs 

Sometimes it's enough,

just to be alone.

Let the cello and the view and the words write their poem.

Words And Waiting

The days are long, and

The living room 

Is dappled in sun, where

The music plays more often,

We

Watch each other from windows,

And from porches

I

Pass the time waiting 

For words,

Like worms

A bird left alone in her nest.

Cello in the Rain

Under a dark sky, never have I

written in such a mood as this.

A dismal abyss, a selfishness,

with cello in my ears.

In Dark Times

To make meaning of it,

To find purpose,

To know it hasn't been in vain, 

I write pages upon pages and why? And for what?

To live a life more inspired or less...

To fill empty churches with my song

And then to find it 

Echoed 

--gone?

Mornings on the Terrace

In each morning, you will find old men.
Old men will tell you,

that there is no other heaven (worth rushing toward, anyway)
like the one here on earth.

Old men will ask you, without words, how this is not paradise enough--

the way you find your slippers waiting for you at the edge of your bed (the same place you left them yesterday, and the yesterdays before that)

In taking your regular seat on the terrace of your local café, day after day after day (or inside, when it rains.)

Of having your breakfast order ready before you even arrive.

Old men know the miracle of a freshly-squeezed glass of orange juice, 

the burnt aroma of coffee as it hangs in the air ... of two eggs.

And of mornings that last for hours, without need of conversation,

or explanation.

Offering

These walls know,

the way the light changes.

The way the rooms are painted.

The candles are lit, start the fire.

The blessings are made, the bath is drawn,

blankets are offered, pour the wine.

This house is a shrine.

See the old pictures, see the books on the shelf,

Notice the art in each corner.

These walls crave solitude, though no one is alone.

Look how the ghosts take a seat at her table.

Springtime in the Village

The windows are open again,
and outside, everything is waking up at once.
People are spilling out into the streets,
like swarms of noisy bees.

When summer comes,
and the sun beckons everyone from their homes;
when it calls them out to worship,

there will be bands in celebration,
and communion on every patio.

There will be singing in the church,
and concerts in the garden.

Their hymns of strings will rise,
in the balmy night air,
where lawn chairs line the path.

Couples will walk hand in hand, each in rhythm with the other.

And they will do this for no other purpose,
but to be held by the arms,

of a new and holy season.

I Did Not See a Radio, but a Typewriter

Because lately, I have no use for the news

for work, or even for food.

For outdoors or for walks, though I am envious of the trees and their icy coats,

each one in its own glassy skin, protective and shimmering against the light.

(The ground is too slippery to walk, why must I go out at all?)

But I am the winter bear who has risen too early from her slumber,
no longer under the spell of sleep but with a head still half-tired and tied up in dreams.

All that I'm hungry for now, are words.

I'd rather spend my days feasting on poems and playing in those summer grasses of the mind,
trying to make something of its beauty.

(Nature writes it's own poetry though and has no need of a translator)

Nonetheless, the breath of the soul calls out, it wants to anyway;
to give it's own song a name--

a voice that comes from someplace else.

So I anchor myself in wood: my antique table,
the hand-carved chest in front of the couch,

The chair in the kitchen.
the one I ask Marc to paint, to strip, to make new again.

Wanting of him to make us a bench; to make use of his hands, 

if only for the sake of beauty.

A man's offering to the world.

Overview

I'm on top of the world

Economy class and smug

In my heels, silk-coat and my hair,

Wind-swept and deliberate,

My pass in my hand,

A lady in charge turning heads.

I feel like I've been rushing toward this train all my life,

And I can afford this ticket for once.

And It won't be alarming,

The bus station late,

Where the homeless get taken on stretchers away,

And the man intrudes the space where I sit,

But you'd think that it would be,

For someone like me--

PTSD.

But this is where I feel at ease

All those years I spent wandering alone,

Lugging every last thing that I had--

My baggage, a journal and pen

Saber-tooth in the jungle and me.

Tonight's talk is a bee in my head-

"The highest form of forgiveness, has nothing to forgive, and that saber-tooth served you."

It did it's best.

I've learned to travel light,

Just my purse on this trip,

A sweater, a scarf and some flats

Because the rest is at home,

Where I want to be,

And both of them loved me,

....I loved them back.

"...and this is what opens your heart" he says 

Thai Massage

lay on the floor, close your eyes and breath

But there is no summer breeze in the evening,

listlessly moving the un-locked gate.

No sun-kissed children soaring on swings,

or wool-wrapped ladies, rocking in chairs.

No bundled-up babies napping within,

or playful pups chasing the last of the leaves.

There is no country house in this home,

of crowded and cramped muscle and bone.

A nervous creature kept in a frame,

flapping its wings against iron and rib.

still the body keeps trying to fly

First Snow

We felt the first bite of cold as we explored

The newly fallen snow on the shore.

Even with the last three days on the lake,

Wind-swept and cloud-heavy,

It came as a suprise

And although the skies carried the promise of rain,

And the lake picked up, loud and full

We expected nothing more.

Yet like an unwanted guest it came,

It's gusty skeleton rattling in the night

Clanking the cottage furnace and waking us both.

We closed the door and rolled over until morning,

When we were awoken by icicle fingers at the window

And thunder--

Cleverly disguised.

Then like a curtain rising and revealing the stage,

I pulled open the blinds.

There stood our restless messenger

We were weary eyed and unprepared for the show.

A quick pang of grief,

Followed by a sobering acceptance

Of a mid-October winter,

And forgiveness of this event.

For nature, in all her glory,

Is an oblivious intruder,

And blameless she remains,

As it is our own hand,

That forces the seasons.

Here we fret like hungry children at our tired mother

And she responds as one would--

Can't satisfy the need.

Our all consuming, always taking

Forever taking, greed.

She's depleted and erratic, unpredictable, unkind.

So she brings us long winter.

We are no match.

Forcing her rhythms to suit our own

Distracted, hot-tempered, flighty,

Unsure....

What Was Kept

I grabbed some of your things

from the cluttered, downstairs room

tins and scraps, notes without meaning, 

two shirts.

Like everything else in that house,

They were stale

thick with smoke and yellowed by neglect,

though you hung them with a care,

that I knew was pride.

Shirts not worn since before I was born, but still you held on.

You held on.

In my desperate attempt to hold on, too

in the midst of what grief does to a daughter,

I grasped at those things, anything

as if they would disappear as quickly and as absolutely as your body did,

when they carried you away.

In your wake were the fragments of our shattered lives,

in that muddied wasteland of us

a junkyard of immortal love trapped in mortal law

gripped by an animal-like sorrow, packing shirts into a broken vintage suitcase

Whatever would fit before leaving.

That night I knew nothing of the relief I had felt,

in the moments after waking up that morning,

in the moments between knowing and not knowing 

when you told me in my dreams,

you were free from all that now.

Sleepless

Sleeplessness has got me hallowed out.

Only a question remains: how can one be so empty

And consumed all at once

Everything but sleep upon me,

Pale-white as a sheet and

The days grow colder still

They say a weather warning is approaching.

The pharmacist spoke of it as he dolled out my pills

I am but a quiet, dry shell

Waiting

On the couch at 5am

The lightest dreams flew into me,

Like a hundred soft grey moths

Safekeeping

I want to show up empty-handed,

Hungry for bread, open as a field

I want to bring only my cup,

And ask for wine 

I want to arrive light, 

Where we take off our coats

I want to leave them at the door,

To both of our homes

I want to take what is stored there,

Whatever is dark

To hold what is hidden, 

In a delicate box

Lined carefully with silk,

...a safekeeping
of talk.

Everything In This Room Is Loved

Like you, but not with the same ease

Before you, and after, in a tapestry of lives

Gifts that I worship: altars

To know beauty and where it came from

Comfort lies in these material things

Without doubt, without 

The terrifying truth of being

The impermanence of breath, attests

Old Bones

Here, in this map of skin

With all it's earthly limbs

Lay rivers and roots unmoving 

In winter's cold

Frozen, old

Despite the seed planted in spring

For this

Tiny stem- a wonder

With strength enough to endure

Any wind or weather 

Morning

To wake, and not rush

To rise quiet and full of sleep

To enter into silent rooms,

Where the sun waits patient behind closed curtains 

Or rain--

The soft comfort of grey

It is here, that I sit

Sipping coffee

Slowly and with gratitude