The Promise of Earth

Falling snow
mingles with pink petals
of apple blossoms
on these last days
of April.

The instinct
to stick out my tongue
and taste the sweetness
is delighted and hopeful
the peas won’t freeze
and the purple haze of lilac
will awaken just as soon
as the clouds clear
and the full moon
breaks through the dark
like your pronouncement
of love, bold and exact
as redemption.

Forgive me
for loving you back
in this unexpected turn of events.
It is,
like this late snow,
breathtaking and confusing
to see the light of flowers glow
while in the same blurry vision
dreams that winter has arrived
to turn back time.

In the other life
that resides in my shoulders
I wrapped my sorrow around me
like a shawl of prayer
willing my worry to arrive
at the dooryard—
making his unhappy deliveries
day after dark day.

Fear was that stray kitten
who would not be coaxed
from between the truth
of my solid ribs
and who waited
for the white flakes of morning
to melt and find a way to trust
in the silence,

understanding the grasp
at the scruff of the neck
was comfort
and might mean home.

Back at my gray window
I look out at the shaking fingers
of maple leaves,
watch the tight curls of a fern
relax even under the weight
of these cold kisses.

I have become my sister,
Emily Dickenson,
gazing from the inside out,
looking for the words to release
unexplained pain
like an exhalation
of a long held breath
or the startled bird
taking to flight.

From this high place
above the landscape,
let me instead notice
I am not a prisoner
without the keys
to my dark cave of a cell,
but rather
the spaces between the elements
of water and fire

and the air lifting
snow gently
to the promise
of earth.

Dream of Losing Everything

In the dream
that comes back to me
night after night,
my mind happily pretends
to lose everything.

In that glorious spring
I first lose my clothes, my vanity
and then my children.

The dishes break like magic,
the glasses shatter.

The house disappears, foundation and all.

My hair falls out in bloody red tufts
and my teeth are all loose
in the confused words of my mouth.

The papers blow away in the purple wind
and my mind. . .

Oh, my mind
is the gold ring
that washes slowly,
as if forever
will never arrive,

down the watery drain.

In Love

I am in love with the new pink
and green dresses
forming at the tips
of the maple branches
outside my window.

These little girls smile
and twirl in the drops of rain
that make me shiver
and pull the blankets up
to the place where the world
wants to get in.

Little dancers
you wake me like noisy,
happy children chattering
with light.

The gray day
will not dampen your delight
in spring that is falling
into the pale green
that glows into the heat
of summer.

Water jewels
catch at your hems
and hum an absent tune
that travels softly
from your wisest voice
to my reluctantly
waking mind
and warm opening of
this understanding heart.

The Sound of Om

Come to the truth
of the mirror again this morning.

Look me in the eye
while your trembling hands
trace the edges
of black against white
on the map of my skin
and I will tell you my story
of so much suffering.

Joy stands alone in the reflection
and will not be lost in the sound
of a clicking clock today.

I will only be convinced
by the shape of your heart
to leave all measurement
to God and anyone else
who would like to judge
my thoughts of loving
the warmth of your fingerprints
above the letters of "yes"
on my lips.

Wrap your arms around all the losses
I will never recover
and I will sink to my knees
and touch your feet with wet tears
and the softness of my hair
that I pledge
to give back to the vanity
of the earth.

I will forgive myself
for everything
if only you will promise
to say my name
in meditation

and when I wrap
strong legs around the universe
and moan quietly under my breath
to the sound of Om.

Blue

This contract with sadness is written
just under the surface of my hide—
blue veins
darting in and out
of white flesh—
heart pounding
on and off
with bursts
of light
flashing
like a beacon on the edge
of roughest waters—
circling and casting out
hope into the fog—
moaning in desperation
long at the side of grief—
the sharp boulders
that will not yield
no matter how they are tossed
in the healing waters of the salty sea.

My love for you
was thrust into a bottle
and conveniently corked
so many lives ago
when I first discovered
you could not be trusted
to honor anything
but the enormous space
you needed to take up in the universe.

I bobbed in that heavy mercury
looking for the waves
that would take me
safely to shore—
to the soft sand of forgiveness
that could not save me
from washing overboard.

In this year
I have unexpectedly
become a blue beachcomber.
Blue in the twilight of all that must
be recovered and released
like the smooth treasures of sea glass
and perfectly sun-bleached shells.

Flying White

If you want to know
something about this woman,
look into the foggy design
on the edges of paper,
imagine what no longer exists
of the light that was once
a brilliant star,
and you will understand
the empty spaces
that fill me now.

Near the ocean
I walk long against the wind
gathering the bodies of broken shells
who rest in the tentacles of the water’s garden
harvested by so much winter anger.

These corpses cast shadows
of negative space on the gestures
I make with my heart
to see more clearly
as I leave comfort
for the cold truth
to find gulls hovering over waves,
glide as if suspended, searching
never finding the flashing silver
scales of trust.

From this shore
the details of flight
are simple, white
and unpainted as the sky
before the arrival
of the rosy hand of dawn,
confusing the scene
with color.

Awake

Awake and too aware
of your arm draped over my body

as if claiming territory
for yourself.

I nearly crawl
our of my skin

waiting to escape
from this falling

this bottom dropping out
from under everything
I hadn’t already lost.

I slip away smoothly
from your sleeping

into the cool darkness
toward another bed

where anonymous pillows become comfort
I wedge into the length of my back,

under my delicate neck,
and between my arms;

my lonely knees.

Here, in my healing pose,
I am learning to fly solo.

Learning to spread
my clipped wings.