Feb21
Feb11
Horses: Five Tanka
With grace, wisdom, patience
even when they are stubborn and
unyielding, they surrender
so patiently, becoming
something we will never be.
With loyalty, understanding, and
the ability to hear pain, smell truth,
they sense things we will never know
or read because we are too foolish,
too stuck in our heads.
In their eyes, worlds—stars, oceans, skies,
all swirled together–inviting you to
enter so you can find everything
you need to do, to know, to feel,
before you can be whole.
Feel their strength, so contained and deliberate,
but so wild and raw, compelling you to
close your eyes and watch them run,
flinging bolts of life every direction,
exchanging ecstatic cries with earth and sky.
Standing next to them, absorbing their presence
is a gift, an opportunity to live and
change, right there in that moment,
with pieces of it, electric ribbons, spinning
in and around you, for days.
Feb2
Full
Sunshine fills the spaces
created by asking
all those questions,
satisfying in a way
that answers never will.
Jan27
The Opposite of Trust
No matter how often abundance
proves itself to be abundant
I still try to lock it away
with the good dishes
I have never used.
Jan21
Differently
“Learning to love differently is hard…”
—Marge Piercy, “To Have Without Holding”
My hands crack and creak
as these fists open, stiff fingers
reaching, trying to remember
how to touch, how to feel.
My heart cramps and catches
as I try unfurling it to reveal
everything it’s been writing, things
it thought nobody wanted to read.
My skin, pale and pasty, grabs
at the mask I try to peel
from the face finally curious
about sunshine again.
My lips, so accustomed
to reciting only certain phrases
struggle to release the wild words
gnawing through their cages.
Exhaustion attacks me;
I want so badly to crawl
back into that safe, tight space,
but my fingers keep reaching,
my heart keeps stretching,
my face craves daylight,
and my lips enjoy the new
shapes they can make.
Jan20
In the Middle of Nowhere
Alone on the snow,
devoured by darkness,
small, lonely, desperate,
begging the night for answers
—messages spelled by stars,
flashing signs pointing the way—
but there are no directions,
no cosmic billboards,
only this heart and this head
trying to find common ground,
and this body, cold, cold, cold.
Jan18
Hostage
Tangled by roots of trees
I forgot I planted,
snared with each step,
captured by my own hands,
too stunned to struggle.
Jan14
Lost
Where you eventually find
yourself
while trying to outrun yourself
That dot on the map
between who you really are
and who you thought you were
The place you need to find
before you can
be found
Jan7
Sixty-Two Miles of Healing
As I headed South, the moon
peeked over the mountains
and winked through the clouds.
Music reached through the stereo
to put his fingers all over me
while the moon hoisted herself
higher until she danced, fat and full,
right in front of me, her orange glow
slipping through the cracks
in my heart, lighting the way for music
to find his way in too, their shining
and singing honoring the brokenness
that allowed them to enter.
Dec30