Inhale/Exhale
I thought I saw something out beyond the barn,
a light perhaps, a reflection off
the window of the house.
Strange little baubles,
blurred like streetlamps in the rain
in a watercolor painting.
Breath, inhale, exhale.
It’s nothing to be afraid of.
But the little girl, holding a basket
of corn beneath a starry sky,
that is something to wonder about.
Is she a figment of my imagination,
a symptom of the hunger I feel,
a sign of the need of the world and its fulfillment,
or simply that of hope and what will
happen in the days, weeks, months to come.
I fear she is an illusion.
I fear that the people need more than
what she can give.
I hope I am wrong.
Breath, inhale, exhale.
I hope that her nemesis, the spirit
of hunger for all things living is more
the illusion than the little girl.
Hunger will devour us all one way or another.
Hunger is not necessarily searching for food
for the body, but food for the soul.
The spirit of hunger is insatiable,
Corn will not satiate its cravings,
but power, fed by the energy of souls
will only increase its cravings.
More people, more souls, more power,
more, more, more is not enough.
Breath, inhale, exhale.
It is the only thing that is real.
Breath, inhale, exhale.
Be alive. Just breath.
Just be.
—Paul Causey
Girl With Corn
In the old way, there was corn,
a food from the stars,
and wheat and rice and taro.
We worked together to plant and gather.
We added our life to the life given us.
Family is given and grown
in just this way.
Song, as we open to it.
Fire.
A girl stands in the night.
Stars open the black behind her.
Her dress is the color of coals.
Corn shines in her basket.
The green of its growing wraps it.
A bird has come to bless the offering.
The girl's hands hold the basket with care.
They hold the plenty.
—Sarah Webb
Rain on Tin
It’s raining here tonight,
the heavens breaking their weeklong fast
with the earth,
their drops landing softly upon my tin roof.
I can hear each drop as it lands,
like pins dropping into a glass bowl
and later, like the sound of bacon
frying in a hot pan.
At some point, their identities blend into one,
like a drum roll over my head,
but if I listen carefully,
I can hear each individual drop
as it hits the roof.
And then, all is quiet
except for the drops hesitating
before they fall from the branches
of the tree outside my window,
shaken loose by the wind
with a sigh and a resigned letting go,
a lingering memory
of the soft rain dancing on tin.
In the morning, the sky will be clear
and I will be able to see for miles.
—Paul Causey
Mezzo Soprano
Dedicated to Tyre Nichols and Veronica Williams
They say there’s video.
I don’t want to see.
I hate these movies where another black brother dies.
I consider the man and the woman who made him.
I curse the men that unmade him.
I curse the silence of I and
America, America.
How we till our rich killing power.
How we stamp our silky dew rags, our many strands of black curls
beneath the steeled toed boot, beneath the iron hearts of power.
They say there’s video.
It’s enough to tear a real heart apart and lay it dying on the lawn.
So much blood runs out
on these streets of America, caught
in the hands, in the aprons of mother,
the sister,
in the name of the father.
There’s too much blood that’s watered this soil.
We think it goes nowhere.
But its slaked the root’s thirsts and made our ghosts stronger.
They say there’s a video.
I don’t want to see.
On flickering screens, he was too much to be.
Time could stop.
Breath could cease.
I would understand
if this mezzo soprano before me
never sang another note
and hung her shrouded soul in dark.
But there’s a bird rattling in her lungs.
It has to get free.
The louder the strings sing all around her,
the harder the wings beat to flee.
Despite all this darkness, despite all this murder,
she lifts her heart’s corners,
smiles to the stage lights,
and the bird flutters free
on the old familiar strings:
We shall overcome,
Someday,
and she makes me believe.
— Emily Romano
Hand
In the gray of the subway platform,
bodies pressed close,
coats wet with melting snow.
At my face, a hand.
It wrapped around the pole,
its nails, curved and sharpened like a cat's,
caked black with dirt.
It was a weapon,
a paw with which to slash,
a hand shaped by fear.
Someone lived in danger,
might need to tumble sideways from sleep
and strike--to defend their life
or their blankets
or their single coin.
When I edged my eyes to see whose hand
I found a short, slight man in worn clothes,
a man grown old unsafe.
He saw through his rheumy eyes
a world different from mine.
But don't we all know fear?
need to defend? wake in darkness?
I recognized that face.
—Sarah Webb
Beliefs
Do I believe as you believe?
Probably not.
Did I believe as you believe?
Somewhat.
Will I believe as you believe?
Definitely Not.
To me, belief is like the ocean near the shore.
Big waves forcing me back to the beach.
Medium waves covering me from head to toe.
Small waves gently lapping at my feet.
Core beliefs
I feel, I was born with these.
Equality for all.
Be kind.
Stand Strong.
Hold the hand of the helpless.
Remove the burden from someone’s back.
Protect the child.
Religious beliefs
I feel, I was gifted.
Love thy Neighbor as thyself.
Feed the people.
Place others’ needs before your own.
Bless the children and the animals.
Gather the lost sheep.
Beliefs can be mystical and contain Grace.
They can be the butterfly in a field of flowers.
They can be Evil, causing destruction and Death.
They can be the hurricane in the ocean.
Beliefs can come and go.
Will my beliefs ever match yours exactly?
Probably not.
Will you try to make your beliefs my own or the other way round?
Probably.
Can we learn to teach our children well?
Can we have our beliefs walk side by side?
Definitely.
—Melissa K. Tolliver
Longing
A galaxy coils.
It echoes
in nautilus, in the spiral of our ear
in the sunflower's seeds curving and crossing.
As above, so below
say the ones before us.
The whirlwind curves round,
and the fern.
And what of longing?
Why does my dog gaze out the window
when I am gone,
the child lift her arms to be held?
Does the bee long for the flower,
the wave for the shore?
I gaze at the hills
as light falls across them
and slowly fades.
What is this hidden land,
this pattern above us in the night?
When I stop, when I feel it,
it is sad but also sweet.
It reaches curious--
it wants to kiss and hold,
it flows out, cups my hands tenderly.
So above, so below.
Does the swirl of stars reach tenderly,
the pear hold out its fruit, tenderly
asking
Who are you?
Rocks burn with this fire, waves rise,
the fox curls round her young,
I quieten, listening,
all of us asking
where are you? what are you?
will you come, will you
come at last?
—Sarah Webb
All the things I cannot know
All the things I will never know, I will never know and in my not knowing, I am comforted and consoled by all the things I have known and can know. There is no sadness in my not knowing, for there is unbounded joy in that which I am blessed to know. I cannot expect to be a glorious, blooming flower but I can bloom where I am planted. I get to be part of this natural world in ways I could not have imagined – living in the mountains, in the desert, by a river, near the woods, on a lake. Having feasted in all the seasons as well as on the seasons of my life, I am humbled and bowed in gratitude.
Today I saw fresh cow parsley as green as green can be on this first day of December as I walked on the trail. The cows had been there and left patties of thanks too. I walk through the trees, watching the leaves fall and accumulate, die and decay and then provide food for new plants and growth next Spring. The birds are fewer and they will return soon in greater numbers, small and large, colorful and camouflaged. The vermilion flycatcher stays and flashes his red coat so we recognize him.
As one of the creatures who inhabit this natural world, I sense my place in it, not as a blooming flower in all its glory but rather as a species able to describe where I am, who I am, what my place is and how I am to be in these sacred moments. Yes, sacred because, like the one who said he sees through a glass dimly and then face to face, I see Creator Spirit where I look and, like Denise Levertov said, being in the orchard, being hungry and tasting the fruit. That is one of a thousand sacred moments that are given to us every day.
When I move from the common and ordinary to the uncommon and extraordinary, that’s a good moment in time and that happens often and comes in many forms. Sometimes it is a slight shift in perception, sometimes it is a big shift in movement. Some are planned, some are not. The latter ones I file under surprised by Grace.
—Gary Gruber
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