THE GONG

One day

the body

the spirit

the heart

in unison 

will crack open.

You will hear the breach.

You will feel the breach

like an ancient gong 

ringing in your bones.

You will become the golden circle

singing from its rung center.

You will become the listening

that accompanies this sonorous sound

as it slowly widens and ripples 

its invisible rings into the silence

that surrounds you and is within you

the way Winter slips into

the darkness of its Solstice

like a night shirt.

Pay attention.

Never look away.

Guard me like an angel.

Protect the arc of my being

with an armor of light.

Know what I need

and what I do not.

This is what the gong will say

and what you will hear

if you are truly listening.

If you meet and greet its message

with the love and devotion it is asking for

you may just heal the holy perimeter

and keep most, if not all,

breaches at bay.

FALLING TO FIRM GROUND

The longing to abide in the oneness 

is the abiding in it.

                                   -James Finely

the acorn does not know 

it carries a giant inside 

nor does the oak remember 

falling as seed to find firm ground

once upon a time

what is sure though

is something must crack open

for branches to become branches 

and for roots to send

their tendrils down

like ink into flesh

branch and root 

are mirrors of each other

they are a circle drawn

in air and earth and in

an ever unfolding terrain

upon which pilgrims may tread—

their paths crossing and uncrossing

like sinews torn and then
retethered over time

or stories unraveling into fictions
after too many tellings

or ancestors long forgotten
then fervently revered

under the cycles and phases
of the sun and moon

BAD REVERSE (...if you can call it that)

You are parked in the space
you are always parked in

and you are not, per usual,
paying attention.

The vehicle—let's just
call it that—is idling, and

your mind is racing, chasing
one thing or another. 

Without thinking you forget
to put your foot on the

clutch—let's just call it that.
Next, you do the one thing 

one should never do under
these circumstances: you

thoughtlessly, hard and fast,
make that quick right-

and-downward movement
with the grip of your hand.

You throw—and I do mean
throw—the stick-shift—let's

just call it that—into reverse.
Almost instantaneously

and simultaneously
two things happen.

The first: your whole body,
from fist to feet, from head,

to heart, to gut—nerves and cells
all—lurch awake. Your bones

and flesh quake to the core.
The second: the sound.

You know the one I mean.
The one that's reminiscent of

the wood chipper in the movie,
Fargo, that one. But this one,

this sound, is distinctly
more metallic. Metal

on metal, I mean.
That kind of gnashing

and gnawing. Anyway...
the simultaneity of these two

things, the sound and the feeling
of grinding, has you, again, without

thinking, shut the engine off,
and in the doing of it

you realize the motor was on
when it  shouldn't have been.

It is in this moment your body
slumps. Then, dazed and nearly

traumatized by the sudden
assault, and in the strange

stillness, you say out loud: What
have I done? There are ways

to go about backing out of
things. And ways not too.

Knowing which is which
is worth remembering,

no matter your age or whether
you are newly licensed or not.

No matter what vehicle you are
driving. Making the wrong

choice may mean you need
more than a new transmission—if

we can call it that—to get the
vehicle up and running again.

THE SHED

I found it.
Like a choice.
And I am grateful
I did.

But it took going into
a dark shed
to learn
the shovel
had always been
with me.
In my grip.

And then it took
shedding the shed
and digging down
instead of out
for me to move 
toward the well within.

WHICH?

Dew on a leaf.

A leaf dappled 

in dew. Canvas

or paint?

Which would you

rather be?

LOOSE LEAVES

Prisoners wriggle free

from the pages

of a foreboding folio.

Hope is unscrupulously

erased from a dispiriting

season. Exposures

are laid bare 

in the broad and darkening

daylight. Laundry's

hung out to dry

in a chilling air. Still

possibility is a nest

that's only woven 

from what is gathered

from leaves

and shadows

and what lies between

surrendering and uncertainty

and the mesh that mixes 

our desires with our amnesia.

THE ONE SONG*

hyacinths push 

through the loamy earth

coyote's howl pierces

the darkness around the moon

let’s do our part

let’s take our turn 

at being 

the Guzla

the singer 

and the instrument 

who through 

a single string only 

braid pain 

and beauty 

into one 

solemn note

one ancient song

one epic story

that holds all of us

now and always

*Inspired by Mark Nepo's book, Seven Thousand Ways to Listen