MY MOTHER’S KEYS

When I took my keys 

from my pocket

something about them

was different.

They were lighter 

than before.

For five years

I've carried my mother’s 

three keys on my key ring.

Today I turned them in.

Her apartment is

no longer hers.

It is somebody else’s 

now. How quickly

the deceased are replaced 

by the living.

There are only two keys

on my key ring today,

the keys to a house

my mother gave me.

The keys look so lonely there

by themselves 

side by side, like strangers 

not knowing what to say. 

Like grief and gratitude

meeting for the first time.

I hold them in the palm 

of my open hand 

and think: 21 grams. 

Could it be that 

the weight of the missing 

keys is the same 

as the weight 

of an ascended soul?

THE BONFIRE*

Any day now

the Neptune Society

will be calling 

to tell me 

that my mother’s 

ashes, that are in transit,

have arrived.

You should burn yourself completely. 

If you do not burn yourself completely, 

then a trace of yourself will be left 

in what you do.

Suzuki Roshi said this 

in a book I just happen 

to be reading right now. 

The timing of the quote

took my breath away.

There is no trace 

of my mother anymore.

Fire has had its way 

with her—which is what 

she wanted. She wanted 

her human form to be 

disrobed of its flesh 

and bone by flame 

when the time came.

I strive daily,

especially now,

to follow in my mother’s 

footsteps, by cremating 

my experience as I live it, 

by trying to cleanse myself 

of conflict and contraction,

so that I might become one

with the inner light of spaciousness 

and the love that resides there.

I want every day to be

a good bonfire,

where my energy burns 

clean and pure, while the self 

goes easefully

up in smoke.

*Inspired by Reverse Meditation: How to Use Your Pain and Most Difficult Emotions as the Doorway to Inner Freedom, by Andrew Holecek.

AN OCTAVE APART

We shared a music.

Though you are

 

no longer here

I continue 

to feel you 

close by.

We are still

together, and 

what's different is 

there's now

just an octave 

between us.

SPEECHLESS*

When a word
is pronounced

we speak it,
we breathe it,

we sound
all its syllables out

in order to
activate its meaning,

its very spirit. 
When the hospital

called to tell me
that my mother

had breathed
her last breath

and used pronounced
to say she had passed

the paradox of the word's meanings
left me speechless.

*In memory of Patricia Marilyn Martin

THE MAZE 

If you let

the most vulnerable part 

of yourself relax 

into the labyrinth of life

don’t be surprised when

love emerges 

from the maze.

ON RETREAT

1.

Snow falling
off branches

         Then,

the happy 
bounce that

comes from
letting go

2.

A blackness
that beats

brightly behind
branches heavy

with snow
A raven

lighting inside
a winter pine

3.

As melting snow

gives way to red earth

the sun climbs behind 

the spine of a pinion tree

Like a heart

coming out of hiding

it beams its love 

unabashedly 

through branches, as spokes 

of brightening light 

GOD’S REPLY 

     in memory of Mary Hope Burroughs

She had been

talking with God

for weeks

and cursing anyone 

who ventured 

to interrupt.

 

It was the only 

conversation she was 

willing to have 

at the time.

When God’s reply

finally came 

after all her waiting

it came 

like a ghost ship

in the night 

that silently took

her Soul away

to the place where 

all good pirates go.

HOMECOMING

Go back to 

where you came from

Step into the church

where you used to

sing as a child

Even though

you can’t carry

a tune

and never really could

lend your voice

to the hymns of today

Let it get lost 

in the larger voice

the voice of the congregation

Hear what it sounds like

to be held, carried

by something

that rises

and swells

with joy

and deep faith

Feel what it feels like

to be a part of

a song

that hears you

and has the power

to sing you back 

to yourself, back

to your soul’s source

once again

ICE

I heard her parched and weary voice 

in the distance cry out for

ice, more ice

and immediately thought of 

the ice in Gabriel García Márquez’ first line 

of One Hundred Years of Solitude

and then thought of the peace 

that was coming her way

 like a solitude well-earned 

like a childhood re-discovered 

after a barrage of

one too many good-byes.

THE TRAPPER

It felt like a dream

but wasn't one.

Maybe it felt dream-like

because someone had

accidentally fallen asleep 

on a couch somewhere

and their little bit of oblivion

somehow filtered into

my world. I don’t know.

But at the time 

I went about setting 

the trap I was setting

I knew nothing about

any day-time dozer.

I only knew that the trap 

was about me 

taunting trust.

And even though 

it wasn’t actually a dream 

it might as well have been

because in dreams

every part of the dream 

is a part of us, they say.

Anyway...what I mean 

to say is: once I woke up 

to what I was doing 

in the non-dream-dream

I clearly saw that

I was the “bear,”

the trap and the trapper

all at once.

And, that while I was the one

that got caught in the jaws 

of my own entrapment,

the so-called dozer,

wherever they were, 

managed to remain unscathed

by any intended subterfuge 

that hung heavy in the air.

All the dozer was really doing 

was getting caught 

up on some 

much needed shut-eye—

which, coincidentally, was 

what saved them 

from getting entangled

in an oblivion 

that wasn't obliged 

to finding any solace 

in trusting trust.

WISHBONE

I feel 

divided.

Half of me 

is wounded

off-balance

tenuous.

At risk.

Lost in 

the stuff of

flesh and bone

Ungrounded.

The other half 

is healthy

a healer

strong.

In full stride. 

Lead by visions

by spirit.

Is rooted to

the earth, the elements 

and soul.

I try to walk 

a straight line

in this body 

of mine

but feel like

 a wishbone

ready to split

in two.

What is the wish

I carry

I wonder?

ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT

Like the image 

not yet risen 

from a darkroom 

developing tray, 

he came to me 

as the whisper

of a wave,

as the faintest 

of feelings. Gradually

he floated 

to the surface

of my being, 

of my body,

as a presence, 

as a spirit 

wanting to exit 

the liminal liquid. 

He wanted 

to enter the world 

as breath, as tears,

as the sound 

of deep sobbing.

And so 

he did.

My dead father

came through me today.

I gave birth to him

through my

morning practice.

I grieved him.

I remembered him.

I wished 

I could 

hold him 

in my arms

like a new born.

I wished 

I could 

rock and cradle him

in the deep well

of the love 

and gratitude

I now have

for all he gave me

that I could not fathom 

I was given

until recently, because 

I had been the “babe” 

for too long

and had been too busy 

with my own 

arrested development, 

too busy trying

to fill in the blanks.

RAIN 

The rain was raining

So hard and so loud

That I held my phone

Up to my the bedroom window

Of my newly renovated 

Double-paned house

While you held your phone

Up to the living room ceiling 

Of your one-hundred-year-old

Brick and timbered home.

We let these rains

At your house and mine

Talk to each other.

 

We did this, I believe,

Because we believed, without

Knowing we did,

That the rain had more 

To say to itself 

Than we did 

To each other.