This Life

We worry if we amount to anything
–when does a gesture of kindness land,
or a gift, a sacrifice of the heart?
Does its worth equal what the recipient decides,
–or you, what about you?
For my heart is troubled,
empty hands requiring trust
feel vulnerable, ill-equipped to discern
what kind of life is more right than another
but who decides? Who knows?

Torment

I feel it rising in me, 
dissatisfaction, anger from
a discontented self
who rejects freedom and
instead chooses torture,
studying how people
offer themselves to the world 
while also seeming
to love who they are.
My heart is complicit in it:
hungry to know how 
people love themselves and
this life too.

Dusk in Fall

A bird has landed on the kale,
the thick leaves bouncing
like a metal spring at the
playground where my children
played when they were
young, and I like that
a month after moving in
we decided the dining room,
where I sit now, would have
a botanical theme. After all,
we know so little about
the miracle of growing things,
and when we, in the church pew,
were listening to children,
adults now, tell stories
of their mom who died
a month ago, which
was the week we moved in,
I was happy we were
asked to wear bright-colored
clothing at the memorial,
the light in this room
fading and beautiful on the wall.

I Tell Them

My plants have been neglected
though not in the usual way,
for I am diligent in my watering,
providing not too little nor
too much. And the sunlight
usually covers them gently,
kissing arms and necks and
elbows equally although some,
when I forget them outside, are
more fragile, susceptible to
crisply drying out than
others and consequentially
have sunspots on their leaves
when I forget that heat
–this July and August’s recipe for
laughter and music when
lemonade and carwashes
and bare feet feel like
the right things to do–
are too much for some and fine
for others, but
I am less hurried now,
attentive to the plants’ quiet
whispers of need,
what food will enrich their soil,
how much space do they need
(are they too crowded in
their potted homes?) and
I tell them I am back
from my journey of
distraction, though my home
displacement is still deep
within me, and my left
shoulder aches from
the strain of lifting
boxes from the garage
to each new room,
and thank them for their
patience with me,
asking forgiveness, my
impatience for a life of
feeling settled and
rooted in what is good
and soul-nutritious and wild.

Steady Now

I want to hold all you show me 
deep inside, 
in a memory vault with firm walls and 
indefatigable capacity to 
never lose people’s stories,
those whose courage to fight 
trauma though it hurts them
makes me forget 
my struggles for just a bit.
So play them now, these
stories queued one by one so
my resolve only grows
to join the soldiers who 
are rooted in Goodness,
fuel for the heart I am 
impatient to find.

Making Amends

In the morning of the first day
upon which I decided
it is okay to know only
as much as I know
(that much is fine)
and I need not pretend to 
pull words from the sky if 
they are not falling 
down, available 
jewels to wear around the
neck that feel like comfort,
a balm of 
goodness on all
the sore places of the ego,
I could let the tiredness come
upon me and receive
it like a friend, a sister
whose home is ready for
hospitality and be gentle
to it, for, I realize, there
is nothing left but kindness
to ease the breaking of
a striving heart.

What We Use

Am I here just thinking of you
empty hands emptied
pen smeared with paint from
when we tried Chèvre then 
White Dove on the walls but
I hold onto it tightly now,
tool of excavation to what
is hidden (what you feel, I
know) so let’s go there
all the way
without apology or road map
all the way
all the way
home.

Rewriting

On the floor I found you,
knees pressed toward
hands outstretched,
head down, wondering
if you’d show me what I
didn’t know. And now
where are you? My impatience
taunts me, for memory can’t 
show me how
to fall in love with 
you again. Break me–
in all the ways I try to 
hold together, my voice
untrustworthy, 
my song with 
no notes to sing. I 
know nothing 
now, in the beginning, 
being created 
once again.

Some-thing

I am at the cusp of 
figuring out how I feel
these tears near the edge
of something and I wonder
will I investigate their origin
or coat this heart with platitudes,
an untrustworthy balm that never
does the job of making anyone
feel better even here in the corner
of the bagel shop where despite
AirPods pressed to my ears 
I can’t help
but hear 
the teenagers come to
order sandwiches for lunch and
my emotions, a delicate palette of
angst and peace spitfire ideas–
you are fine, no, you are worried,
no, scared, no, just melancholy and
that is okay, you know, you know
you are okay and
the tears fall on the pages then
this kindness of listening
to loneliness implore
again and again, 
hear me.

If My Life Were to Tell You

Say it out now, loud enough so I 

can hear it, the way you say my 

name, like it is holy, ground worth

walking on, like you enjoy it here,

and I see it, feel it on these stones

beneath my feet, my hands scraping

air like it can hold me up, afraid as I

am of falling, so hear me, this story 

I’ve never told, at least not in a way my

self recognizes, in the journey

when you know me, all the false

starts and beautiful inroads (some 

might call them lies) that show me

one truth–I want you here, the way 

you tell me the truth and make it 

palatable, this castle of sand knocked 

over with tired feet.

Inscription

Not one place can tell the story 

holding me captive here. After all, 

this book has pages not yet 

read. But I want to believe

they are beautiful ones,

the story-telling beautiful,

the characters (or just me) 

captivating and believable to 

you so that when you read

it (how I love that you are reading it)

you will know me–your mark upon 

these pages making you smile because 

the story has been yours all along.

The Battle

The first words are the hardest

finding the will

corralling it

pinning it down in

order

to silence the inner critic

that wants to mute

thought

the miraculous that comes

with surrender,

belief that there is something here

true to discover.

Listen now.

Hear the beating heart,

the connection with the

divine. Can you believe it (with me)?

For you can see me,

can’t you,

hear me listening now

battling the lie that

all is void and there

is nothing

left to say.

The House at 56

She tells me she can see them

the three of them

doing cartwheels on the lawn,

on the patch out front under the window

and hemmed in by a hedge so

if you stood on the sidewalk

you could barely see 

their small heads

and I see it too,

the crinkled smiles of something

more specific than childhood,

little hands in the dirt that wrap

around my neck.

Their bright faces mystify me.

I hear their laughter and

I gulp it down like medicine

like air, like memory,

and I wonder what imprints they

will leave on these walls.

I look out this same front window

and realize my heart has memorized

more than I knew,

how time holds all life,

what feels lost is never gone.

February in California

Fog nestles itself against the house

for me to scoop up in my hands

to create an opening

a hallway

a door to run through

open to sunshine’s laughter

all the people in their colored jackets

of blue and red and gold

welcome travelers who come seeking

respite, the quiet place of mirth

where heaven’s lodging

is provided in all weather

the tucked away places 

as I perch

on my couch

legs crossed

dog hugging my bare feet

and study orange on still branches

watching gray melt away

in morning sun.

Whereabout

I sit in darkness. The room,

a converted garage where we keep 

our bikes on the wall and our desks

kissing each other near the bookshelves,

is still,  although the Mountain View train

rumbles through a few miles away around six

and my dog will on occasion moan and then sigh

and lick his lips, his teeth clacking together after he yawns, 

and then lick himself until I can’t block out the sound anymore 

and demand that he stop but yet it is still, a stretched out

place where I am convinced the world is far away 

and I am in some separate place accessible and

inaccessible even to myself and I work to 

find clues as to my whereabouts, pulling

out a slice of memory—an uneasy 

wrenching of the heart, but

 it is really the present that 

both haunts and invites, 

the past crowding in, 

wanting to be included while the  current

moments want to stay untouched and unharmed.

And in the pauses of discussion between the two, a staggering 

around like two drunken teenagers wanting to have their way, I let the stillness 

quiet them, do the work I cannot accomplish on my own and light

a candle, its light flickering in brilliant warm gold while night 

blinks open its eyes a bit and dark eases itself 

out of the room.

The Kitchen

How can I tell you

the things that happened here

in this space

my body, hips and stomach

leaning, white wood on gray concrete,

for it amazed me 

(the way mothers are amazed by

their love,

disarming them completely), 

the way she moved 

with such happiness,

delight in her small body,

dancing to music we played,

and her ability to climb

up to the kitchen counter 

from the stool and press up against

her brothers’ shoulders while

their little hands gripped avocado for a snack.

And now I stand there, both myself and

watching myself

amazed at my capability to love

with an intensity that would surely kill me

except it saves me too 

and I am so grateful, 

praying with all those years—

help me love better—

that my love wasn’t what

had to be enough

for us all.

Here

How much more meaningful life

will be when

I think

all the things

figure out how to limit my mind from

cavorting in unpleasant places

like your illness and worries

about death

and the piles of receipts

you dutifully collect in a canvas bag

in the basement to shred

but really I want to care more

at the expense of knowing less

not about you but about why

the mattering of even

ideas of things means anything

more than what each one is:

attention fixed on a single moment

where everything holds me here.

Abundance

Let this day be when it begins

and all possibility sings loud and long

a chorus we drape around our shoulders

a balm on our necks

not for medicinal purposes but for

the throwing off of regret

and the crushing weight of time

making all moments what we fear

rather than celebrate,

small jewels in our hands

that grow in abundance when we

open our palms, our fingers

wide and brave,

and set them free to

be beautiful,

existing for what they are and nothing else

we make them to be, 

like you,

like me,

as love covers us and we submerge 

completely

inside it and never leave,

our jeweled hearts beating that song

you hear now don’t you?

Delicious Meaning

I am desperate to create

beauty-full things

that curve and

swirl in my hands,

note-flinging acrobats

coaxing meaning (how

I long

for a paint-tipped

jewel-tone blue and grass green!)

but I can’t, you see,

unless you show me,

tell it to me like

a story

my eyes and heart can read

and then my mind will hear it

too and my body,

hungry and insatiable as it is,

will consume it readily

like the first meal

and I will want you

more then

in the way

you meant art

to sing.

The Mothers

How can I tell you

the fear of leaving this

landscape both

terrible and kind

when small hands

were pocketed

in our own,

our voices

sang stories

of imaginary bear hunts

and our laps creased

rocking chairs,

soft wisps of air

brushing our cheeks.

The exodus began long ago

before we were ready,

with their car keys in pockets

and backpacks crammed with

devices for learning to leave,

returning but never

to what was.

And together

we push

against the precipice

of beginning

and ending,

leaning wearily

where once

we stood

with confidence,

the map we held

firm in our hands.