Being the Wind over Prairies

'Belonging'... the reasons we wander the worlds but come back to the smells and sounds of our hometowns. That has rarely been summarized so aptly. We cannot build a new life in another world. For we are crippled by the constraints of father time.

“Nothing can match the treasure of common memories, of trials endured together, of quarrels and reconciliations and generous emotions. It is idle, having planted an acorn in the morning, to expect that afternoon to sit in the shade of the oak.” ― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Wind, Sand, and Stars

But when we have ambled enough in enough places among enough people...our hearts become the wind over prairies, whistling through the grasses, carrying the sound of grazing animals. We begin to belong in a sense, everywhere (as much as in a sense, nowhere).

Yet in our immense rush to see and be, what is the price we pay? We forget that we have not much time. (And, after all “It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important.” )

“Please-tame me!' he said.
'I want to, very much,' the little prince replied. 'But I have not much time. I have friends to discover, and a great many things to understand.'
'One only understands the things that one tames,' said the fox. 'Men have no more time to understand anything. They buy things all ready made at the shops. But there is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship, and so men have no friends any more. If you want a friend, tame me.'
'What must I do, to tame you?' asked the little prince.
'You must be very patient,' replied the fox. 'First you will sit down at a little distance from me-like that-in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstandings. But you will sit a little closer to me, every day...” 

― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince

Walk the mile

It is suddenly,
A little loud
A tad too cacophonous
In your world.

Sickness - like an answer
Settles with wet legs
On your dazzled heart.

You lay paralyzed,
Glaring at walls of photographs
Remembering.

Swirling smoke from half-spent cigars,
Songs of posterity - nestle
In red corners of your eyes.

The doing needs to be done,
You stick a needle in your shoe,
Walk the mile.
Walk the mile.
Walk the mile.

July 19th, 2012

First Rain

"In the words of Terry Pratchett - Leopards don't change their shorts."


Bah, life is good!


Good life holler to all kindred spirits out there :)

We Become our Choices

'When will I learn to read it
plainly, slowly, uncolored by hope or desire?
Not to understand it, only to see.'

When indeed?


Rebus


By
Jane Hirshfield


You work with what you are given,
the red clay of grief,
the black clay of stubbornness going on after.
Clay that tastes of care or carelessness,
clay that smells of the bottoms of rivers or dust.


Each thought is a life you have lived or failed to live,
each word is a dish you have eaten or left on the table.
There are honeys so bitter
no one would willingly choose to take them.
The clay takes them: honey of weariness, honey of vanity,
honey of cruelty, fear.


This rebus - slip and stubbornness,
bottom of river, my own consumed life -
when will I learn to read it
plainly, slowly, uncolored by hope or desire?
Not to understand it, only to see.


As water given sugar sweetens, given salt grows salty,
we become our choices.
Each yes, each no continues,
this one a ladder, that one an anvil or cup.


The ladder leans into its darkness.
The anvil leans into its silence.
The cup sits empty.


How can I enter this question the clay has asked?


(Rebus -- "A representation of words in the form of pictures or symbols, often presented as a puzzle.")

Via Asha's blog

A Sofa in a Room

The second coming is indeed at hand.
I watched the moon flicker blue behind thin twilight clouds in the city of thousand thoughts.
I drove by a woman unsteadily cradling a bouquet of fragrant flowers - on a street corner with no takers.
I wandered the streets in search for a sofa, a sofa in a room, a room in a clutter, a clutter called home.
I met myself, at every corner, from years past and years thence, shuddering off the spiders of moldy memories.
I watched machines doing mechanical things in robotic repetition; boys stealing kisses; men mauling mistresses; women pecking men - all masquerading meaning.
I saw raindrops marching in yellow reichs on shriveled flowers of christmas-lit silver oaks.
I reached out and found myself again, in a gentle smile across the table; in locks of blonde hair in a faraway land; in a pair of soft brown eyes at the breadth of a breath.
I grew my nails long and they stretched out farther, divorcing my fingertips.
I thought and thought, wave upon rising wave, on the night the moon was largest.
I crashed on my rocky shores and crumbled to sand.


Through long labor, I delivered myself, heaving a fresh sigh in this strange old world.


Jun 27th, 2012.

Who Deserves What

“Deserves it! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.”

― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

Growing a Garden

Rukhiya emailed me this peace today. It speaks to me of grace, the grace of a woman...and integrity and self worth. Many of these walk my mind nowadays. Between waiting and seeking for answers, I have but one usurper of norms, one disturber of peace ~ hope. It barges into my world like the Tasmanian devil, displacing everything. Poking at little tucked in dreams, growing red wings for large chained ones. Hope I must lose and then I may finally - rest in peace.






'After awhile you learn the subtle difference
Between holding a hand and chaining a soul.
And you learn that love doesn't mean leaning
And company doesn't mean security.
And you begin to understand that kisses aren't contracts
And presents aren't promises,
And you begin to accept your defeats
With your head held high and your eyes wide open.
With the grace of a woman, not the grief of a child.
You learn to build your roads
On today because tomorrow's ground
Is too uncertain for plans, and futures have
A way of falling down in midflight.
After awhile you learn that even sunshine
Burns if you get too much.
So you plant your own garden and decorate
Your own soul, instead of waiting
For someone to bring you flowers.
And you learn that you really can endure,
That you really are strong.
And you really do have worth.
And you learn and learn...and you learn
With every goodbye you learn'




~ Veronica A. Shoffstall

Let me be a Bird

Suddenly very grateful to life for the privilege of being able to have fine teas, listening to BBC radio (Honest Doubt). Sitting outside my own body on the road, hypothetically selling hair clips, I am watching myself through chinks of the draped window.... And am envious.


Let me be a Bird


Many gardens, we love like needy lovers
Entering
to pluck fruit
drink off a stream
snip long-stemmed roses.


Some gardens, we nourish like mothers
Bringing
water in urns
to parched grasses
planting pale purple irises.


Rarely, we watch over like birds
Picking
dead leaves
to build houses
Twit at strangers
Guarding the fruit
Kissing flowers - giving and taking.


I choose to be a bird,
Small, swift, full of song
Pollinating
Tilling the soil
Sewing long leaves to live in.


June 22nd, 2012.