Return to the Earth

These tulips
in the glass vase
on the morning table
have faded;
petals crisp
at the edges,
leaves yellow
and wilting.

Still,
I love them.
Their long necks
proud,
determined
to be seen
for who they are
until they return
to the earth,

broken
into the soil,
food of the worms
like all of us,
the body gone.

These souls
will sleep
in the rich soil.
The spirit hidden
in a simple, round bulb.

The promise of fleeting pleasure
rewritten again and again.

Good Friday

You are leaving me again.
You who is my constant companion,
walking ahead and out of sight
on a trail full of turns
toward mystery.

You have appeared out of nowhere.
A friend on the bus,
the stranger who held my hand in the night
while looking at the stars,
some boy who made me laugh
at my own ignorance,
a workmate who carries the heaviest loads,
the musician who delights my soul
with stories,
a great mind who asks what I think
about everything,
a traveler, a seeker
like I have always been.

You walk away from me
and I am uneasy
even before I know
you are gone;
disappearing
just as I really know
who you are.

I grieve
for what was never
really mine.

Confession

Lean in closer to me, child.
Lean in close and whisper the words;
the deepest sorrows of your heart,
rain and coldest wind disturbing
the quiet of the pulse.

Whisper what you will not
say out loud
and be released--
a cage containing a single song bird
emptied into nothingness,
or the final thrashing about
in panic
like a covey
of partridges
startled
into flight.

Released,
nonetheless.

Let go of the ground.
Let go and leave this world--
get lost in the wild
abandon
of loving
kindness.

I hear the outline of your voice
calling out, fear in the night,
and trace the dark shadow
of the hunting hawk
above the trembling body
waiting to fall
to Earth
and deliver
yet another soul
unto the open sky.

Listen

I am not here
but for the sound
of my breathing.

The inhale,
my companion.

The exhale,
the guard who unlocks
my cell
and commands me
toward the freedom
of silence.

Mary Meditation at Dawn

The sun
has managed to wake me
again
climbing high over the hills
of the river bank
to ignite the air around me
where birds and their songs
are making sense out of music.

Mary Magdeline
was there with the dawn too,
on these last days before Easter,
when the sun woke her teacher;
her sweetest friend,
woke them over the dry hills
of their own secret terror,
their own fatal mistakes.

The memory says that man was his friend,
loved for his betrayals, lies,
and for the insult of stealing coins
from the purse of the poor,
but Mary loved the teacher;
the wiser soul--
her own little lamb.

Mary Magdeline loved the way
her hair smelled
after she oiled and perfumed
the tired feet of this intimate stranger
and with that rich scent
she carried him,
beyond the body,
to the embrace
of a tomb.

Wake up to the violence
of that death,
that longing to give away everything,
and you might understand faith
in time that travels
inside light.

You who believes in nothing
might pull words out of the air,
like birds and a forgotten song,
to find meaning
in the promise of a love
that becomes as empty
as a ghost
that whispers
near memory--

a meditation
at dawn.

Something New--80 Days

I have been challenged by a fellow writer to try and write every day for 80 days. It seems like a reasonable way to build some discipline and to create some serious space for my writing life. It is so easy when we are in full time other occupations to make room for writing. So many other things take the center stage in my life. My children (rightly so). My work. . .all of it. Taking care of life's many chores. Admiring the world and all life has to offer.

This is an opportunity to expand and refine my devotion to words and to all that it means for me. Just as the season of Lent and the path to Easter nears that ending, I will start this new journey with my words as a way to find some center in my writing life.

June 15th will be the target to see where it takes me.

May my words be blessed and full and rich with knowledge and better understanding of myself and of the world around me.