Category: Poetic Prose

All is rising

My loves,

All of you with the open hearts and the hard earned souls, the curious minds, the writers and poets and painters and thinkers, all of you who believe, and pay attention, and fight the good fight – all of you who fell to your knees with the shock of it all — I thank you for being in this world.

I have been so heartsick, and angry, and most spectacularly blindsided. I have wondered if all the good does any good at all. If good even matters. If kindness is just a kind of naiveté, that lives inside the bubble along with my French press and my fair isle sweaters and my cranberry chevre. If silence is just a way to stay deaf. If words are a just a way to stay still. If prayer is just a white man’s way around. If light can really illuminate dark.

In the last few weeks, even my pond feels privileged, like its tucked itself into the prettiest trees and proclaimed itself complete. And all the fields feel haunted by the ghosts of civil war, and all the birds circle for prey. Even the sea is creaking and chained, even the branches hang waiting, even the flame is frightful again.

Even Gilligan — who the hell gets a Boston Terrier? Why didn’t I adopt a shelter dog?

As I prepare for Thanksgiving, Trader Joe’s seems ridiculous. So does my Macbook Pro and the way that man just smiled at me.

Why arrange the flowers? Or tell you how the moss looks? Instead let me tell you about my first boss, and my second, and my third – all of whom grabbed my pussy, too.

Why laugh? Or turn the word hope over in my teeth? Instead let me live just one day in the constant despair of the marginalized – or even meet someone completely unlike myself.

Why forgive? Or try to see the other side of things? Instead let my rage destroy this horror of humanity.

And oh, my very soul! All of these things I’ve been writing – all that work bubbling up from the deep well of my center – suddenly looks like it’s floated on the surface all its life – just skimmed off the top by my uppity Brita filter. Pointless. Useless. Just one less plastic bottle in an ocean of debris.
I have tried all the usual things – wine, bourbon, cake – but still, I can’t be calmed. I have been rudely awakened, horribly startled by an alarming orange face. I want to slap it hard and go back to sleep, but I can’t.

Waking up is hard. I am humbled, to my knees, because I thought I knew. And I am once again struck, as I have been so many times in my life, that what I knew to be true was not true at all.

Everything is different, now. As it always is, with every new awakening. Everything is different. And as my eyes adjust to a whole new world, one that’s always been there but I didn’t have the capacity, or strength, or courage, or experience to see, I hear people say come back to bed. While others work to convince me everything is truly well and I need not be so heartsick.
And still others call me forward to lead new armies. I am astounded by the mobilization of so many of my friends. The constant call to arms. The instant organization.

There is urgency. All is rising, as am I. All is rising, as are the seas. All is rising, as is the dawn.

All is rising, as is my gratitude for the good in the world. For you, my loves. For you. Because to be awake means to see it all – the bird, and the prey. The man, and the monster. Goodness holds it both and all; not blind, not myopic, not half asleep. But both, and all.

All is rising, now. As are we. And with it must come gratitude for the beauty of the world, for the poet, for the prayer, for the stillness of the pond. For you, my loves. For you.

Monster & Muse

The moon is a monster;
A clown without feature
White faced and bloated
As if it floated from the sewer

And as my gaze is dragged from my body
And ripped from my head
And my eyes roll back
With slack-jawed stupidity

I’m in the middle of the street
With my mouth hanging open
Waiting for a worm to drop into my throat
And feed my lonely fear

I turn my back and still it looms
Standing far too close
Threatening me with the horror
Of how minuscule I am.

But the moon is also a muse,
A soul beyond circumstance
Untethered and glowing
As if it’s always belonged

And as my gaze is lifted from my body
And orbits ‘round my heart
My lashes shimmer
With star-filled tears

I’m in the middle of the sea
With my arms stretched out
Waiting for a prayer to rise from my throat
Worthy enough to meet you where you are

And though my feet are still, still it shines
Across every border and every blind
Uniting the universe with the gravity
Of how miraculous we are.

Trailing

Where have I been?
Out to a place that can’t bear the endings,
The way I buy the pear but forget the brie
And put on my shoes but never walk
And stare at the pond from the kitchen window

When I lose what I found and forget my thought
And words trail into fog
The way the path disappears
The way the leaves lie
The way that blue is the only way out
But I’m jealous of the sky

Where have I been?
Out to a place where love loses its legs,
The familiar slump of the saviorless
The curbsided remnant
The unrescued refuse
The way that I lie
Soaked to the motionless side

While you lift with a murmur and a wing
And a prayer falls behind you
The way the words thin into air
The way the wind swallows
The way that out is the only way in
But I’m trapped behind my teeth

Where have I been?
Out to a place that wraps ‘round my wrist
The unbreakable bonds of desire
The way the blinds close
The way the covers hide
The way the truth lies
In here, where I have been waiting like a fool for love’s return.

As if it will crawl in through the windows
Bearing baskets of cheeses
Loosening my mouth
Slicing me a pear and filling me
And all my vases with peonies.
As if love lies waiting
At the foot of the couch
In here, where I’ve forgotten all the words for
Out there, where someone could finally hear me.

And what of the starlings in the fields?
They blacken the sky
And shadow the green
And fall to the earth
And deafen the day
But what of the way they lift you?

Where have you been, they call from the trees;
Love’s come home,
Out to a place that meets you halfway —
Out to a place
That meets you.

Eye Chart

There was already one perfect boy, and one perfect girl, when I was born with a crossed eye. Branded as lazy by surgeons and specialists, I focused on ways to prove myself industrious, productive, hard working; but my sister had vacuumed before I woke up, and my brother had read all the books.

Still, being the youngest with an eye patch was hard to look away from, and I did okay until another perfect boy and another perfect girl came along with adorable, unstoppable energy. From there and forever more, my eye and I wandered aimlessly through the middle of the perfect family.

This is the story I told myself, and this is the story that stuck. And now if I’m not diligent, this is the story that shows up at book clubs and parties, bound between two immovable forces: My fierce need to elbow my way to the center of things, or my jealous heart, which stands by the carrot table muttering “marsha, marsha, marsha!”

And here I am at 56; I write every morning then run to the world’s refrigerator to post myself. It may be that it’s a safe way to ask to be seen without making eye contact. It may be that I’m hoarding tiny blue thumbs to make up for my one green eye. But it’s also a way to rewrite the story; to see things more clearly; beginning with a one-of-a-kind little girl, who was born squinting into the sun.

Shiva

During all the bluster and the blue, while the geese and the squirrels distracted me, the leaves covered all the mirrors. They went around to each; to the pond, to the stream, to the smallest pool and puddle; and fell in honor of the light. They were the ones who were first to arrive, and they were the first to die. And they were the ones to gently ask that I go elsewhere for my reflection.

So I stand before the unfamiliar. The tangled hedge I know to be true is gone, the cornfield is blank, and there’s too much space between things. The woods are made of bones and breath; the birds have nowhere to hide.

But here at the edge of something new, I can see what I’d forgotten: that branches grow in scribbles and loops, that shadows start and end, and all the leaves that fell before, lead through woods and out.

 

 

Cow

I have a lot of work to do today but I feel impossibly tired, like I’ve been standing all night in a crowded stall. It’s 6:00 am and my brain is absent; my body moves in single file toward the day, following the slow herd of morning routine.

Determined to wake more fully, I head out for a walk and bring along my garden sheers; I’ll carry back a handful of something wild and green for my soul to chew on while I work. But instead of walking, I plod and stand and dumbly stare, and manage to make it only as far as a roadside patch at the end of the driveway. And now here I sit, slumped at my desk staring at a blank page and a dusty tangle of half-asters. I’m only part way to industry, and nowhere near inspiration.

My head hangs lower.

You know how you take a drive and see a hillside of cows and suddenly feel connected? You feel so lifted-up that you find yourself squealing and pointing and screaming COW! as if you are whale watching in a pasture? Well the last thing you want to think about just then is how all of their relatives are shuffling and chuting their way toward the end of the world in some slaughterhouse 3 exits down.

It’s hard to hold two opposing thoughts, and today I couldn’t do it. I woke both branded and free, both cattle and cow, and ended so exhausted by the struggle that I got nowhere, just stood stock still; squeezed between art and commerce like Temple Grandin in her hug box.

Oh low is me, I know. But there is only one way to wake, and it’s not in single file. We were made to thunder across plains. We were made to wake up, and be free.

Addict

I smoked my first cigarette to fill the tiniest gap; a fragile moment where I couldn’t find a witty thing to say, where eye contact had been accidental and uncomfortable, where there was no distraction from the empty space between me and this strange man. My first cigarette was a cover story for my time away, but he didn’t even notice I was gone. And so I groped for a cigarette and he for a match, and we burned a bridge across our empty hearts.

It’s been a year since I quit smoking, 4 months since I gave up cake, 3 months since I was forced to break it off with Jon Stewart. And still sometimes my own breath feels too insubstantial; I inhale an emptiness, I grope for what used to be, I channel surf my way through time. I yearn for something solid to fasten myself to. And it’s not a goddamned carrot.

I don’t think it’s always the monumental losses that lead to addiction. One giant broken moment you can point to and say “ah HA! That’s why he’s a heroin addict, a smoker, an alcoholic. That’s why she sleeps with Little Debbie.” I think sometimes addiction sneaks into the second between things; between Jon and Trevor, you and a stranger, you and your own sadness.

Love is created in relationship. And so is grief. And in the heartbeat between the two, treacherous and glorious things can happen. Like bridges that last. Or bridges that burn.

Faith

Through my living room window, a tree stands spectacular. It’s luminous, like some yellow light shines from within. Even on this charcoal smudge of a morning it radiates gold, as if it spent the entire summer drinking sun and staggered to this day.

I worry about the coming rain; the treetop sways and nods; the leaves may fall and leave a bare-branched view. And when my company arrives next week my living room will seem bleak. Without distraction, they may notice the stain on the white couch. Without leaf, I may have to justify why I live in New Hampshire. I worry there will be nothing for them to see but a litter of leaves, passed out in gutters.

I strain to see the sky, to count the number of leaves left, to know what’s coming, but I can’t see a thing but what I’ve seen before. I know for a fact the leaves will fall. It’s bound to be winter. I might as well drape a strategic throw over the couch right now. I might as well call ahead and apologize for miscalculating the autumn peak. I might as well check movie times, vacuum, find a job at Starbucks.

Oh, this fragile moment. Just me, hanging from a glowing tree staring at a blank page. Doubt tugs like rising wind. It rustles and scrapes, and threatens to pull me away. I could fall at any moment; topple over like a pile of bills, like I have before.

What do I trust? Where is my faith? It lives in this fragile moment right here. From this silent place, I return to that sun-drunk tree outside my window. I see it sway and sigh and I will wait right where I am, so the light knows where to find me.

Indian Summer

I stand here between summer and sweater, unsure. I stand in bare feet while the wild geese fly, on empty beaches, on green lawns, in warm sun. I’m caught empty handed, without bug spray or boot, in this uncertain space between done and next. I see zinnias fade and woodpiles grow, and a bay without boat, and a day without name.

I hear both gull and goose; each calls their invitation. The gull cries “Come Back!” and I yearn to circle ‘round and sleep on a sunbaked rock, but time has told me I could get stuck in a June day waiting, while seasons pass and I grow older in place, having gone nowhere; just staring at a sky winged with wishes.

The goose calls, “Let’s go!” and I feel an anxious urge to join the great productive V toward a shared destination. What relief to hurl myself away from this unsure in-between; to migrate toward a certain purpose; to drift on the wing of another; to be carried away by the ancient instinct to belong.

I stand with nowhere to go but toward becoming. I was carried here by June days and dropped from the beak of a bird to arrive at the threshold of my own creation: in bare feet while the wild geese fly.