Wage Kindness

"Wage your sorrows as blankets for the shivering.

The thought that my sorrow could be useful to another

is something I have not considered. I would like it to be true.

This lets sorrow have its full range,  even though it seems a stretch 

to actually end one's shivering.

"Wage your despair [to] feed the fire of hope."

Yes, feeding the fire of hope.

My despair is plentiful and ready to blaze.

"Build bridges for the repentants, for the returning.

Yes, even them. Wage an open hand in forgiveness."

These are the lines that propel me to share this poem.

I confess to a certain amount of cynicism given

our history in this country.  May our forgiveness

bring about truth and fairness.

May it not feed a fire of revenge.

Wage yourself against the evidence of dying,

and give life to another."

We are all in the process of dying...

bringing joy and gratitude

into the gravest of situations

is resistance of the bravest kind.

It is everything.

 

Lives In My Chest

I don't know about you but this "messy, howling creature"

has been acting this way for quite some time now.  

I'm not sure it's necessary to calm her down...

better to give her a magic carpet and a map to places 

that need to hear her roar.

Perhaps lend her a band with trumpets playing reveille

to gather goodness into one giant song 

weaving us into one boisterous chorus,

with speakers reaching every heart...

to reconnect us and put an end to indecency, 

 so we remember the forgotten,

 rebuild and strengthen fairness...

applying it generously...leaving no one out.

 Return honest justice to our lands and people.

Then we can begin repairing what's been broken...

 healing what is ailing...

 reconnecting neighbors...  mending divisions...

 honoring lost lives...  comforting those hurting...

letting teachers teach... evening the playing field...

ripening what is unripe in ourselves and our world.

Let's welcome this "messy, howling creature".

We need her.

We need us.

 

Sing From Your Soul

". . .over every holy place of death

 in your story."

This quote touches 

a very tender place for me.

There have been deaths 

in holy places in my story, 

so excruciating I can no longer resurrect them,

 leaving blank places where I long 

to hold vivid, precious, memories.

"Serenade the dry, cracked pieces..."

My serenade is

 the opposite of musical...

it's a circling around, 

focusing my mind

on what shards of memory are there...

and peering through the haze 

hoping my body will help

 my mind recall the treasures 

of when my girls were small.

The wonder of it is this...

the wild beauty exists 

in their presence today...

and that's what matters most...

for which I’m infinitely grateful.

In Case You've Forgotten

"There are waterfalls that exist beneath the ocean, 

larger than any on land and places 

where no light has ever reached, 

yet life still exists there. "

How I would love to explore beneath the ocean.

That fact that "no light ever reaches yet lift still exists" 

fills me with amazement.

". . .jellyfish that can return to an earlier stage of life instead of dying."

This is something I was not aware of.

If the T. dohrnii jellyfish is exposed to environmental stress, physical assault, or is sick or old, it can revert to the polyp stage, forming a new polyp colony.^[5] It does this through the cell development process of transdifferentiation, which alters the differentiated state of the cells and transforms them into new types of cells.

Theoretically, this process can go on indefinitely, effectively rendering the jellyfish biologically immortal,^[3][6] although in practice individuals can still die. In nature, most Turritopsis dohrnii are likely to succumb to predation or disease in the medusa stage without reverting to the polyp form.^[7]Wikipedia

" . . .animals that can sense the earth's magnetic field, 

navigating entire continents without getting lost,

. . .your own heart has a magnetic field that extends beyond your body."  

Of course Monarchs come to mind

and many, many other creatures who navigate the globe by instinct.

"You live on a planet where your senses filter out most of reality

 just so you can function, meaning you are always 

living inside a version of it and never seeing it all."

While this sounds comforting, especially if we would be

nonfunctioning if we were able to take it all in,

it would be interesting to experience, for a minute or two.

If one could tolerate it that long?

Life these days in this country might be a tiny taste of it?

It's easy to become stagnant and numb 

when things are overwhelming and threatening.

I'm happy to be reminded of the astonishing happenings

going on mostly unnoticed in the universe and

feel enormous gratitude for those who study and explore

and share their findings, letting us in on the marvels they encounter.

It's why I want to do whatever small thing I can to 

treat our planet the way it deserves to be treated.

 

 

Dear Peace

"You are one of the few things left that cannot be purchased,

but must instead be cultivated and shaped over time."

This hurts my heart with the decades spent cultivating

peace in the world destroyed in a rash act of aggression.

We all find ourselves like the Spring Beauty, with 

"mouths searching for the right words to speak or sing."

We are still cultivating and shaping precious peace

whether we're doing so quietly through simple acts

of gentle kindness, or loudly with posters,

phone calls, and solidarity with decency.

Even when it seems futile, we know it is not.

It matters.  We matter.  ALL of us matter.

 

To Be Wild

"Love of nature,

delight in silence,

a voice free to say spontaneous things,

exuberant curiosity in the face of the unknown"?

Sounds like heaven,

sounds like nirvana,

sounds like paradise.

Sounds like Earth as it should be.

 

Inner Acreage

"Sometimes I forget this inner world is there.

I start believing only in the outer world. 

How exhausting life is then."

Don't we all know how mind numbing it is out there.

The more often you set your GPS for your inner terrain,

the easier it is to navigate the journey, right?

I keep setting the GPS against outside interference.

Sometimes, it's agreeable, others, decidedly not.

The practice continues.

". . .when I still. . .I'm out of the way. 

Then everything is the way."

Key phrase being, when I still.

"There are no words there, but look at me,

trying anyway to explain this nothing to do

and nowhere and nothing to experience

which is everything."

This is a life long tendency...it started with

trying to explain eternity to myself in second grade.

". . .like a traveler trying to take a dozen photos

to represent a whole country, only to discover

they're all blank."

Because, no matter how many layers you apply,

you simply cannot capture the majesty and the mystery

of that liminal space where truth and goodness reside.

It's there...it simply refuses to be "proven".

 

Sweet Light

What makes you burn?

Pay attention.

Let it guide your actions.

Some burnings glow beneath those surface

of outrages designed to distract

and temporary tantrums over 

momentary annoyances.

Notice the difference. 

Listen for the deep burnings...

the ones that stay smoldering,

the ones that spark back time after time,

sometimes for decades.

Ask yourself: "if no one you respect

is watching, what would you do?"

Follow that thought.

It matters.

 

Everything

"What is time to the spider knitting her intricate

angles and outlines against the trusting morning sun?"

I love this line...thinking of the spider's legs as 

wee knitting needles spinning the yarn from her saliva

as she weaves her delicate, bullet-proof web.

"Any day is made up of what's spent--

the brief surge and the wane of curiosity,

the stretch to accept the temporary.

Temporary is coming to my attention often

these days.  How fleeting everyone is,

how precious the time they are here.

Luxuriating in who and what crosses my path.

"To kneel and look closely at everything

is everything."

The marvels brought to us by microscopes

and telescopes testify to the human desire

and ability to "look closely".

Yet, the only instruments necessary are our eyes

and/or our imagination.  The wonder of "seeing"

what is not tangible or physical in the moment

is another way of seeing.

Live is everything.  

 

Dear Mother Earth

"dear mother earth,"

because of you...

I notice bluets growing 

amidst thick grass and feel delight.

A cooling breeze 

on a hot day brings a sigh of pleasure.

Bodies of water, of many sizes, always presenting

 a different image are an endless  marvel.

I whoop at my first sighting  of a hummer 

of the season on the honeysuckle.

The return of the bloodroot, the trillium, the trout lilies,

remind me how reliable you are.

You provide more wonders than I can name.

Add on all I cannot name, and all that hasn't been discovered.

Mother Earth, you are not only an astonishing artist;

you are also a supreme provider 

of all things beautiful, intricate, complex, 

nourishing and necessary.

It's a feast of plenty and everyone's invited.

May we celebrate your generosity

by taking great care of you.

 

Enough

". . .enough of the pointing to the world, weary and desperate,

encough of the brutal and the border, 

enough of can you see me, can you hear me,

enough I am human. . .

enough of the animal saving me, enough of the

high [low] water,

enough sorrow..."

She manages to squeeze so many incidents a person

can identify with, it leaves me breathless and wrung out

even to read it.

And then the gut punch of an ending.

"I am asking you to touch me."

What human, animal, plant, rock isn't hungry for touch?

These words shook me deep in my solar plexus.

Deeper yet,  into that cavern of spirit some call a soul.

A place even a surgeon can't find.

Words can do that, I realize.  Bravo to Ada for proving it to me.

 

Instructions For Having A Soul

This is remarkable.

"from time to time, let it kneel in a place that is holy,

like the simple cathedral of the willows."

Or your favorite spot in the woods, at the river,

in your vegetable garden, a wildflower patch,

a graveside of a loved one, 

next to a puddle mirroring the sky...

make sure to note your own reflection.

"All it wants is to live, to keep becoming."

Stretch ourselves even the tiniest bit.

Applaud vigorously. 

Keep becoming. 

 Let our inside out once in awhile.

"You cannot save the world but you can

open the window for the trapped wren

in the cellar."

We are the trapped wren in the cellar.

"Read a book to a blind man, to your father."

Is your father the blind man?

If not, find a blind man and read to him.

"Tell a child you do believe her anger."

Listen to your own.  Believe it.

Honor it. Let it teach you.

"Make your life the first life you save."

 

In The Hush

"Nature doesn't ask me to toughen up."

It can be a struggle to stay soft when

the world seems gripped by "strong", 

wrong minded humans, attempting to exert

their will upon the rest of us.

"softness is strength, and

that being deeply human is part 

of belonging here."

And we do belong.  We are a perfect fit

no matter who and where we are.

Stay stubborn.

Stay you.

 

Another Morning

Which is exactly why we must remain stubborn

enough to stay.  

PS:  If Hungary can do it, so can we.

 

Hush

"how do hear the wordless, the wise?

. . . the fresh, the new, the true."

I would also include the timeless,

the classic, the enduringly true.

Not the worn out but the worn in,

the time tested.

". . .hush the blast of noise and ask the trees,

the chickadees to point us inward."

What trees do we listen to?

I'd say all of them...the virgin forests,

the sprout, the seedling, the sapling, the mature, the stump...

as well as the fallen, the decomposing, the burning, the ashes and the absent.

The hush within us is where our truest, most alive self resides.

Visiting there is no easy venture yet worth the effort,

even when it leaves you weepy and spent...

truth can be excruciating,

truth can be exhausting.  

Making your own path through it takes

 everything you have been, 

everything you are and 

everything you are becoming

and alchemizes you into the finest, 

supremely intricate, 

endlessly resilient, 

totally irreplaceable 

truly amazing river of goodness 

you already are.

 

Ours Is Not The Task

And here it is: "Any small, calm thing that one soul

can to do help another soul. to assist some portion

of this poor suffering world, will help immensely."

I keep reminding myself of this when things become

so horrifying and unbelievably ghastly.

I repeat any small, calm thing...

any small, calm thing over and over.

It keeps me on the lookout for opportunities.

You never know if your act of kindness becomes 

 the twig that brings down the empire.

It's the accumulation of heartfelt actions

that turn the tide. 

On a slightly different note,

Here is HCR's last statement in her post today

about the end of the civil war.  It's well worth a read.

"The Civil War was won not by the dashing sons of wealthy planters,

 but by men like Grant, who dragged himself out of his blankets and 

pulled a dirty soldier’s uniform over his pounding head

 on an April morning because he knew 

he had to get up and get to work."  HCR

We will not lose our democracy to billionaires.

And every kind gesture to relieve suffering matters.

 

Things Nature Taught Me

Things Nature Is Teaching me...

You can't always trust the weather report...

best to check the sky with your own eyes.

Pay attention to the small things...tiny vignettes

of exquisite art lie in the most unexpected places.

There is beauty in decay.

Soak in the magnificence of the moment.

It can vanish in a heartbeat.

There is always more to learn.

Invisible happenings matter.

There is nothing more astonishing

than a visitation from the wild.

The humblest creature 

is doing mighty work.

There is way, way more going on

than you can see on the surface.

You don't have to remember the name

of something in order to fall in love.

Weeds are in the eyes of the beholder.

There is wonder in the way

things appear and disappear

and appear again, time after time.

 

The Stirring

"I can't help but string words, one at a time,

until there is a web woven from my heart to yours."

What a delicious way to describe what most of us do

with these marks on the page or the screen.

", , ,want to know that you feel it too,

this stirring, this pulse of life coaxing us closer. . ."

Never doubt the invisible web that words can weave

from one heart to another.  It's what makes 

the river of goodness flow strong among us.

It matters.

"Let us scatter our gold everywhere."

As valuable as coins, dollars, investments; arguably more so,

it deposits immeasurable riches into our bloodstream.

 

Boiling Point

 To hear what its 

like to live under constant threat like this,

makes me realize how amazingly fortunate we've been.

It's no wonder humans from countries where

danger, torture and death are constant threats,

used to risk life and limb to come here.

What can one do from our relatively safe abode?

Bear witness, pay attention, do not grow numb to it,

keep the innocent victims close to our heart...

 devise some small ritual to honor their suffering;

carry them with us as we move through our days.

Strengthen the power of joy and kindness

every way we can.

We will not surrender to cruelty.

May we remember the best way to resist

violence, cruelty and hate

is to plant seeds of caring wherever we are...

We are doing this...together. 

More and more every day.

We will continue...we will prevail.

You Are Made Of

 "Those who did both and never knew the difference."

Most of us can resonate with this, don't you think?

I'd go so far as to say that loving doesn't happen

without unintentional hurting.

"In the end, you are what you choose to be,

the hands opening or the fists clenching."

Love the image and the action of this 

last line.  I confess to fists clenching

more than I like to admit, these days.

I grieve how much this is happening in our world

and what it leads to.

May we concentrate on hands opening

to each other and to goodness.

I Don't Love You With

Eternal comfort in two sentences.

 

Drip Study

A longer poem but so delicious, its worth every word.

"The body always tells the truth first."

Even when you're highly skilled at ignoring

the messages from your container of skin and bones 

overflowing with breathtaking and breath making things

of immense and astonishing intricacy and wonder...

it continues its telling until you wake up and pay attention.

"The way anger prefers motion to confession."

How many time have I folded clothes or vacuumed,

or scanned the cupboards and the screen

for something, anything to squelch the rage before it hurt someone?

"This wasn't chaos. It was accumulation.

Years of swallowed sentences learning velocity."

Wow. Wow. Wow. 

"Years of swallowed sentences learning velocity"?

This verse makes my ears ring.

"There's no center here.  No horizon.

Just the evidence of staying alive

long enough to empty yourself

without asking permission."

How many of us get the chance...Or should I say TAKE

the chance to empty ourselves of every fragment of yes when we mean no,

every ounce of compliancy, every drop of pleasing, every molecule of agreeable?

"This is what it looks like when

control finally admits defeat

and something more honest takes over."

As someone who believes deeply in mutual respect

and decency, it appears to me we are witnessing 

a counterfeit form of "honesty"...

if you want to call it that...  "Telling it like it is" 

as a form of cruel belittlement of others 

does not equal any kind of integrity in my book. 

Telling it like it is, is not an adequate excuse

for objectifying others,

 and demonizing those one sees as inferior.

It is not honesty, 

it is deceit, 

it is fraud, 

it is wrong.  

To have it prevail in a seat of power

is a crime against our universe.