A prose poem in list

1.
ONE day that doesn't require anything from anyone. 
2.
Just one day to sit in a pool, stare up at the sky, read a book, stick my hands in soil. 
3.
Stick my toes in sand. 
4. 
Daydream. count clouds. paint, draw, doodle. 
5. 
Make cookies that no one but me will eat. Eat half the dough and throw the rest in the freezer for a rainy day.
6.
Jump on a trampoline, skip through the park, jump rope.
7.
 Sit quietly for an hour in my backyard doing absolutely nothing but drinking iced tea and looking at my toes next to the grass. 
8.
Watch grass grow. 
9.
Pick flowers and then pick the petals off one by one.
10.
Drink hot tea and imagine the possibilities in the tea leaves. 
11.
Bake bread, get my fingers in the dough, squish them around. 
12.
Let someone else clean up the dishes. 
13. 
Watch movies and eat candy until I feel sick to my stomach. 
14.
Sit in a paddling pool in the backyard and watch bees. 
15.
Quiet the loud in my mind. 
16.
Quiet the fear. 
17.
Quell the anxiety that encroaches when I have no freedom of thought.

What does it mean to be the sky?

You are the sky.

Everything else – it’s just the weather.

Today I am experiencing a storm
inside the skies are blustery and dark and tumultuous
even though the sun is shining outside, as it must always do in 
Phoenix in June.
Surprisingly, 
I have been living under this bright sun, and so
thankful to be there, for so many months, 
I had almost forgotten what it was like

to have my sky darken, 
the clouds pass over
for no apparent reason
other than a shift in the air pressure
or a butterfly flapping its wings in Cuba.

Much like weather, 
my mood can darken with a small twist, a thoughtless word spoken by
my girlfriend or a thought that passes through my head uninvited.

Living at the whims of my own emotions
is never
a day at the ball park

especially when the night is long and 
I only sleep for 3 hours and
when i do sleep the dreams are full of 
random wild children and plastic wagons being pushed into a 
blue clear sea, only to find that when i land with a splash in the water i am holding my favorite book
above my head, trying to save it. What would 
Freud say about that dream? What would you say?

This week I cut off a piece of my finger.
This is not a metaphor, I actually did cut it off
by mistake, in the kitchen on Sunday while
making dinner for my kids and my girl.

I feel like a part of me was left behind on that cutting board
but in fact, it was wrapped in a plastic bag, packed in ice
toted to the E.R. and then placed in the 
medical waste receptacle, because it could not be reattached.

The sun/son

Her mind has entered into a place of
no-mind
she cannot tell if this is a good thing
or bad
but the sunlight on the desktop
is beautiful
she moves through her days
endlessly
pursuing the happiness
that she knows resides in her heart
if only she can access that
tight closed place

The sun
on the mountain
in the morning
on the drive to work
inspires her to exclaim to her son
Oh! Look at that!
As the moon on the other side
shouts out to her
you can do this!
You are going to be fine!
Even if your period never comes
and the IUD you got when you
were still married to your husband
is shouting out in pain
trying to expel itself from your body

you can take one small step and
one deep breath
you can drop off your boy and
go to work
you can marvel at the beauty of
the sun.

Refracted

The sun is different this time of year, she notices.
And not just because it’s going down earlier, setting even before she leaves
work now,
but also in how it slants through her windows, piercing her eyes,
reflecting off of her desk in bright
sideways rays which make it hard to see things clearly.

Too much light, refracted off of surfaces
can make it hard to see, she notes.

She pauses now, collecting her spirits,
noticing the darkness has grown significant,
surprising for this time of day.
(Was it cloudy when she stepped outside? She can’t remember.)

Sips her coffee,
which is too hot.
Turns on a desk lamp.

Thinks for a bit.
What is being avoided today?
Typically in a given day, she knows she is avoiding something.
Maybe it’s work that needs to happen,
or maybe something more important, like psychological work.
Digging through old scars to get to the point of things.

Dredging up that old dreck is no fun,
she thinks. Maybe I’ll save it for another day.

She steps back from the poem she is writing,
stops again to look at the great expanse of freedom before her
and wonders why she feels so stuck.

11_1_12

We were married
almost one year ago
to the
day.

You are
starting to hear
my heart song
which is
a
wail.

You didn’t hear
it
when
it was
a
whisper

a
tiny
voice
which
i
could
barely
speak
out
loud.

but now
that voice
is a solemn
cry.
a steady weeping

and now
you hear
it.

Too bad.
I
am
angry
now.

You think
this
can
be fixed
with
popsicles
and
band-aids

kisses
on my
ouches

like a
father
kisses
the
skinned
knees

of his
daughter

but this
is not
a skinned
knee.

This
is my heart

and it
is
tired
of
aching.

Where I'm from

(composed July 29, 2009)


I am from tumbleweeds and saguaro cactus, from Push-up Pops and Pop-Rocks, Capri-sun and sliced oranges, their juices dripping down your forearms leaving wavy, sticky lines.
I am from arid, hot wind blowing your hair in too many directions at once and drying your sweat before it even leaks from your pores.
I am from the thirsty palm tree, the aloe vera plant, the coyote and the family of quail running across the road in front of your car.
I am from Labor Day cookouts on a hand-built fire-pit, and lanky red-heads, Grandma Dot and Aunt Mary Lou and Great-Grandma Gert.
I am from insomnia and passive-aggressive silence and leaving to Patagonia with all her stuff packed in the school bus.
From "The Man wants you to work so you can become a consumer and support his Corporate Machine."  From “No Nukes” and “US Out of the Contra” and “Keep your laws off my body.”

I am from Mother Mary, full of Grace.  From all God’s critters got a place in the choir. From George Fox and William Penn and “Love is like a magic penny.”
I'm from Stonyclove Farm, from the rolling hills of Ridgewood, NJ. From gooey enchiladas and spicy chiles rellenos and cheese souffle made my Grandma Dot, but "Shhh, don't be too loud or you'll make it fall."

From the girl who left home at 16 to hitchhike across the country with strangers.
From the could-have-climbed-the-corporate-ladder but instead became a onetime mountain-man.
From the Birkenstock-wearing PTA mom driving us to school in her dusty 20 year old beat-up Volkswagen van.  
From driving across the border so mom can get a root canal because we don't have dental insurance. 

From  four kids, two parents and a giant shaggy dog driving from state to state in a white school bus.  
From two-week long camping trips with no toilet, no shower, no other human beings for miles around.  From seeing snow (in August!) on the top of a mountain.
From tofu and tabbouleh and cous-cous.  
From being vegetarian when it wasn’t “cool” or “hip” or “Green.”  From “But what do you EAT? Can you at least have hamburgers?”  
I am from drinking miso-soup when you’re sick and swallowing bitter yellow goldenseal capsules to help heal a cold. 
From "You don't need stitches, it's only a flesh wound."
I am from a big scar across his abdomen from the war that he did not like to talk about.  
I am from dusty boxes of photos under the bed, from a wardrobe full of black and white photo albums, from a velvet-lined jewelry box with Grandma’s old costume jewelry which must be kept hidden in the attic, away from the prying eyes of children and would-be thieves.

She rocks me into the deep

(for b.) written 8/21/12

She Rocks me into the deep with her soul arms wrapped around me.

Can you see it? She asked me Where did you go? It’s another
Place
A letting go,
a vast ocean
of darkness which is not dark
only space/time

Leaping

to where you need to be
healing
your Soul vibration.

A love that is like
no Other- the primordial rhythm-
pulsing through you
as you
know. you feel. you are. I am.
Love/light/love

peace. Place has no meaning in the place of love.

Light beings are all of us
We know no darkness,
only love-being. We are that

which we were born to be-

Unblemished as we were at our conception-
undamaged unmasked by our mothers’ and our fathers’ experiences.

She came to me in the night
and brought me to this world again.
And I was no longer afraid
I knew I could let go of the fear
and not be held back.

I know there is no such thing as pain
only blocked
energy and “Dive into it.” She said. “You can be free.”

So Dive in.
Into the oceanic love and light
of the waves washing over you

See the shining eye

the blue/purple light when you let go and
Be Free.

Allow your Self to transcend

into the heaven here on Earth.


2. After Care for the Heart

As above,

so below.

You are the truth love light beauty creative

soul self Energy

You are vibrating with this
Peace in a new way
but you always have known

You are coming back to your Soul Being.
Love being.
Love light
love.

All blessings.