dress rehearsal

dress rehearsal

for dying leaves—

Monarch butterfly

—Melanie Alberts

To our Cat Mika

I'm sorry you had to leave, Mika,

I think you were ready, stumbling splay-legged, 

no place soft enough to rest your bony body,

though we fought hard to keep you,

to say no to the shot that set you still at last.

Set you still and set you free.

Just days before you died

we took you to the trees beside the lake.

Waves splashed the rocks below, 

amber-clear and full of light, 

the air, too, full of light

slanting from the rise and fall of the water,

a shimmer of possibility

that jostled into being and subsided.

The leaves glistened, rich,

each acorn cap, cactus nub, full of meaning.

You lay on the leaf drift

above a ledge of red grit sandstone

in the sound of the waves and the wind off the water,

and I thought this is what heaven is like,

thought this is what my father's death was like that day, 

why I knew before I climbed the stair that he had gone.

Thank you for that, that glimpse.

We can call it heaven or the primal void

or the vast bright water that brings forth cats and men and stars.

All I know is that it shines.

—Sarah Webb

Beyond Pickleweed, with appreciation to Peter Coyote

pickleweed

haberdashery

incremental

amphibious

momentous

miniature

albatross

hullaballoo

foppish

lardycake

avuncular

smithereens

words between

underneath

just beyond

other words

words words words

all the way down

a name of a thing

we take as a

bona fide

a characterization

we take for 

character

but beyond

the mouth feel

and mind grab

there is 

no thing

no name

no form

no sight, no sight consciousness

no sound, no sound consciousness

no suffering, no ending of suffering

no birth, no death

no being, no non-being

useful

            and abused

beautiful

            and harsh

transported on a 

magical carpet

of words

gone now

gone

to the other shore

fat crows

in the picklewood

skedaddle!

—Nandiya Nyx

Bumblebees

So very long ago

there were bumblebees here

slow and ponderous

like old World War II cargo aircraft

buzzing through the skies.

They loved the asters and the frostweed

the goldeneye and palafoxia.

In the prairies

the bluestem rose tall,

turning terra cotta in the cold.

The switchgrass massive and light,

interwoven with the fall air.

The Indiangrass bringing its yellow flames 

to the darkening colors of the autumn.

The big bumbly bumblebees

flew slow from blossom to blossom

slurping up nectar,

muddling in the pollen with their big bumbly feet, 

tracking it everywhere they flew,

to the joy and delight of the flowers.

They were here with their cousins, 

the solitary bees.

Ascetic, tiny, sipping like anorexics.

But still the pollen grains on their feet,

transferring them to new flowers 

to cycle life into the next season.

So very long ago

there weren’t any honeybees.

Those upstart European imports, soft,

needing amenities and care.

There were just the wild prairies

grown over ancient seas,

the savannah trees intermittent and burn-hardened.

Then the honeybees came

and elbowed their way into the frostweed and goldeneye

but still there was enough

and all lived together.

Then we came, European, soft, needing amenities.

And, too smart for our own good, we discovered too much

in the name of science and progress and commerce.

How to clear the land with the napalm of the bulldozers and shredders.

How to kill the weeds with carcinogens

that seeped their dark death to the innocent grasses.

How to kill the bees with neonicotinoids

and find their little bodies, stiff and dead, by the water.

The bumblebees grew fewer and fewer,

and as I tended my land, I found less and less of them,

buzzily muddling their way into the flowers.

But I gardened organic, banned the potent ugly toxins

on my little piece of land, and hoped.

In the last year or two, they have started to return.

All sizes: huge snuffling hogs of bumblebees

Medium moderate bumblebees

and even diminutive daintyish ones, though still

unmistakably squarish and bumbly.

The honeybees live here too, in their hive by the edge of the woods,

underneath the spinning fan sculptures.

But they do not fight the bumblebees 

or harass the little solitary ones.

There is goldeneye and aster enough for all, 

and frostweed enough even for the monarchs and emperors

when they migrate through.

It won’t be so significant when I am gone

but I love to think of the bumblebees

and hope I played a tiny part

in their going on.

—Elayne Lansford

I Want

I don't want to be afraid.

I don't want resentment.

I don't want anger.

I don't want to feel helpless.

And yet when you stop me,

that is all I can feel.

I don't want to pray.

“Please keep me alive.

Let me survive

Please lord!

Let me go back home

to my own.”

I want to feel safe,

like you, and him, and her.

I want to be me

and still be safe.

I want you to see me.

I want you to accept me

With all my differences.

I don't want you to be my predator.

I want you to be my protector.

I want you,

yes, you.

You in blue.

I want you to see me

as one of your own.

I want you to let me breathe.

—S. Swan

Inspired from Peter Coyote and Susan Wooldridge discussing Tongue of a Crow

Here's the interview: https://www.bookpassage.com/event/peter-coyote-tongue-crow-online-event

Kim Mosley

A Blessing for the Dark

You asked, What will I do

when I am wild and lonely

and you are not there?

What will I do in that dark?

I will give you a blessing

folded tight for that time.

No, you will not see me—

oh, passing in the street perhaps

as I have seen my brother, 

in dreams, for sure, as I have talked 

to my father at a restaurant table—

but that does not mean that I am not there.

If you speak to me, I will answer.

You will feel my words warm in your heart

as if I had said, I‘m right here,

as if I had put my hand in yours and kept it there

and you will know what I would have said—

what I am saying—

through the shift in the light,

the flick of your cat‘s ear,

through memory, yes,

but by the rush, too, of blood through you,

your softening.

When you think there‘s no way to go on,

know that I sit beside you

silent, but loving you,

that I see how strong you are

as you let yourself steady,

as you choose carefully.

And when you find ones you love,

ones who love you,

I am inside their love,

part of their laugh, their playful pounce,

their hand in yours.

A mound of potatoes, this blessing,

a flower on a spiraling vine,

your breath easing in the soft dark.

Give it to someone hungry.

Give it to yourself.

—Sarah Webb

Language of Place

“To be native to a place, we must learn to speak its language.”

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

When I came into this world,

        I was not a native to this land.

At the time, I knew no language,

        no words, thoughts, ideas,

                or even concepts of meaning.

        But I grew and listened and learned.

I spent the next 60 plus years

        learning a language that for all intents and purposes

                barely scratches the surface

                        of communication between people,

        much less with the life

                that surrounds us on this earth.

What good is a language

        where people cannot agree

                on common acts of decency?

        Where a human race can know for certain

                that its existence is not in peril

                        of annihilating each other

                                because we can’t communicate.

What good is a language

        that holds no truth

                to be self-evident?

        For all people?

Perhaps I expect too much of a language

        and not enough of those who speak it.

                Perhaps I just haven’t learned

                        the right words.

I have been told

        there is great wisdom

                in listening,

        and in truth, there is great peace in just that.

                Sitting, listening, breathing.

                        Is there a better language?

The true natives of this land,

        the hawk, the deer, the bear,

                all the lives not human,

        know of a simpler way of living, communicating

                and we still don’t know what they are saying.

                        We don’t have a clue.

Perhaps one day

        we’ll learn.    Perhaps.

Has anyone seen a pig fly?

—Paul Causey

Word Wreck

You sat next to me, in the car, describing

loudly, about how outrageous the 

posting is, accusing you of being careless

by traveling during these pandemic times.

I asked how long has this person 

known you, and you responded 

“I only met her once.” I suggested

you could just ignore her, or consider

that perhaps she doesn’t know another

way to say she cares about you.

My words agitate you further and

yelling, you say there is no reason to 

continue to talking to me, I can stop 

and let you out of the car. 

This is the first time you have spoken

to me like this ~ how did we get to this

intersection ~ wrecking any opportunity

for dialogue, conversation?

The silence that settles between us

feels like a balm, yet too weak to 

ease my feelings. I breathe into myself,

I breathe into you. 

I let the words of silence to say

what there is no room to say, 

no way to say, to speak into your pain, 

and mine.

—Martha Ward

Gratitude... and Sorrow Fill my Heart

—Kim Mosley

Delight

S. Swan reading “Delight”

  

Every time, I say, I am happy, 

I feel embarrassed, 

as if I didn’t have the right  

to enjoy my own life. 

I live in a furnace, 

I know that. 

How could I forget the pain 

I live in? 

But that’s just it! 

I have lost so so much 

that I appreciate  

so so much more 

what I still have. 

To be able to see 

the blue sky  

with a cloud, 

being caressed by sunlight, 

brings joy to my soul. 

Being able to cuddle up 

with my purring kitty cats. 

Being able to laugh 

in a conversation with a friend. 

Being able to move, 

walk and talk, 

read, write,  

and most of all,  

create. 

The point is, 

I say to myself, 

“You can’t feel happy  

when you’re feeling so much pain. 

You’re supposed to feel utterly depressed. 

You are in so much pain, 

you should be screaming!” 

But that’s just it. 

I am surrounded and tortured by flames. I am suffering so much already, 

that it would be a pity 

to not be able to take delight  

in the beauty of life. 

—S. Swan

  

S. Swan discussing ”Delight”

Oxman Cenote

After a year of lockdown, after getting our jabs, my husband and I pack our carry-on bags and fly
to Cancun. To swim in some of the Yucatan peninsula’s cenotes is more tempting to us than
strolling through museums, so we buy snorkels and seek out sinkholes which were sacred to the
Mayan people: one, a freshwater pool on the edge of the ocean; another, a cave where bats dart
barely above our heads; and an ancient river supported by mangroves, home to an elusive
alligator named Panchito. The deepest of all at nearly 150 feet is the Oxman cenote outside of the
pueblo magico of Valladolid. We descend 73 steps to the water of a collapsed cave, its walls lined with the impossibly long roots of trees that guard the upper edge of the cenote. At the water
level, chattering crowds of life-vested swimmers line up on a dock to grab the rope swing and
propel themselves in. Some are adept at holding on, others drop quickly as their grips slip.
Around the perimeter, lifelines of the trees dangle and dip into the cool blue water.

What are they reaching for?

The word is grounded—
one tree offers
one hundred roots

Mayans valued cenotes for rituals of sacrifice, where the otherworld was accessed as easily as
diving in and opening the eyes. Before arriving in Valladolid, before our first snorkel trip, we
spend ten days in Akumal where I paint on the beach. Each morning, while crews shovel
sargassum, the smelly seaweed piling up on the shore, I open my travel watercolor set and
unscrew the brush from the reservoir tube. I dip the tube into the sea rushing at my ankles, fill it
with salt water to convert the brackish pyramids of seaweed into wreaths. I don’t care for
elevating sargassum; I want to point out how we construct barriers to our sense of peace. I want
to capture the transient beauty of these blooms we earthbound tourists call a “natural disaster.”

Walking towards water—
my memory stops
at the first wave

I’m six and planted in the surf of a beach in the Florida Keys. My family is who-knows-where,
all there is before me is the gently rushing water, the warm sandbed, and a horizon that hints at
all possibilities.

Roots traverse soil
waves erode the sands—
we are nourished

This 58 year old body lines up behind giggling kids who push off from the rope-swing dock with
ease. Toes gripping the platform, I eye the rope guided by a middle-aged guy working for tips
from anyone with a pocket of spare centavos. I build up my nerve and notice that as I grab the
rope, the chattering din around me quiets down...oh, great. Let’s watch the old lady crash and
burn! I take a breath and swing as far as the rope lets me, turn slightly, and drop into the surface.
This win is marred by water rushing up my nose. I surface, snort, and hear the voices resume
their excited pace. This feat closes the afternoon. Next morning, my husband and I wake up early
enough to have Oxman cenote to ourselves. We dive in, float on our backs as a family of
swallows call to each other, making connections between their perches in the dangling roots.
Above our heads, nothing more miraculous than a day begins.

Nature is a moment
of endless beauty—
birdsong etches the clouds

—Melanie Alberts

Turning to Silence

It is a time of turning.

A time when

nothing is as it was,

despite our wishes for 

it to be otherwise.

We have no choice

but to let life unfold

as it will, hard as

it may seem

to bear and accept.

And so we turn

to each other

for comfort

in the knowledge

that we are not

in fact alone.

And we fall

into silence 

as words prove

to be inadequate.

But it is precisely 

the arms

of Silence

that can best hold 

our sorrow and pain

For Silence makes no demands

and is ever present for us,

ready to hold the heart

that has been hollowed 

out by the river of grief.

And so, we sit in silence

holding each other and being held.

—Laurie Winnette