The rains have arrived,
Remnants of the hurricane.
If I go outside and lift my face,
Will I taste the salt tang of gulf waters,
Hear the faint sound of Parlez Nous A Boire drift on the wind,
Catch the tantalizing scent of my father’s gumbo?
Or will I find the salt of tears cried by all who’ve lost,
Hear the shriek of a roof as it is torn away,
And smell the smoke from fires that cannot be quenched?
Nostalgia is easy for me,
For I am in the mountains and far from this devastation.
I am geographically lucky at the moment.
steam rises from the cup. consider these things
the cup shatters and the world explodes
celadon shards and tea float in the midst of primal debris.
chaos and noise and confusion
breathe, and then:
sit in silence,
sipping the usual cup of tea.
I swing my mala and throw it.
It tears a hole in the fabric of this existence.
The beads disappear one by one.
I follow them,
While reflecting on impermanence.
I recite gate gate paragate
As I evanesce.
I rose before dawn in the late summer.
I sat on the porch outside my room.
The air was still and redolent with the salty musky scent of the bayou.
The bull frogs were still croaking from the night,
The crickets were chirping,
And a few birds had begun their morning calls.
I drank my usual Gunpowder Green in a hand-thrown mug
And realized I must make a trip to New Orleans soon.
I needed more tea.
How to quiet my mind?
It often seems like a flock of restless birds:
The thoughts dart here and there, as they will.
I breathe and bid them fly away,
Yet they perch to preen and call,
Gently mocking my efforts.
Perhaps the greater wisdom
Says simply to allow the birds
To be as they are
And expand my limited meditation.
This is why I prefer to avoid the hue and cry of crowds.
The surface conviviality of group encounters
Does not come easily to me.
I would far rather engage with one person
And have a brief but meaningful conversation.
I am uninterested in simply oiling the mechanism of polite flow.
Tell me something true and real that matters to you,
Else simply smile (or not) and walk past.
I like that better than chit-chat about the weather.
Unless you are a farmer.
Then the weather is of utmost importance.
I’ve learned to listen, a most useful skill,
And nod and make social-approval noises.
Then I make my way home,
Convinced more than ever
That I am not really human
And merely dwell among you,
Always a stranger in a very strange land.
Layer upon layer upon layer
Faceted as petals
Endless as waves
Infinite in time and space
Breathe in, breathe out
Rest in impermanence
(Inspired By A Piece OF Nancy Garretson’s)
How to delineate a life lived?
Let us use not temporal posts of days or years
But limn the finer measure
Of love given and received
Of kindness extended with a free hand
Of compassion shown in minute and larger ways
Of laughter shared with those around.
Choose to see joy
And continue to delight in our communal dance.
This is a time of abeyance,
A lacuna before the coming of fall.
The air shimmers with heat
And the low buzz of insects.
Rainfall offers little respite,
Only plangent noise.
How not to repine
And search for a proem
In cooler nights and darkening days?
