Poetry added on 10/29/02
Hibernation
These are the thoughts I'm thinking.
Out of reach of all the things I want to hold;
The
Una that I miss, the earnest mischief of
animals, the outside wind and the black
Ocean's
sharp smell. But here I am sitting, wanting
words more than anything, overflowing,
overwhelming
myself. Seven years of satin honey-eyed
affection. Horizonless destinations,
freedom
without structure. Emotion without
pattern. Looking inside myself, the balance
and
fierce protectiveness of people that I
love. Then there is also an
endless
carelessness. The thought of living with
her again made me happy, but her life's
rhythm
is interrupted. I've absorbed as much
as I can. I feel the numb heaviness of
rocks
in my shoes, dragging my feet; noticing
allows an indulgence of the same
me
that scoffs at self pity, unwinding
those cowboy ideals from the core.
to
think that I extended the invitation. I need
understanding and, shutting out the world,
sleep.
What do I want, God
I want your gentleness and understanding,
the flexibility of forgiveness
the resiliency of your spirit.
If I hurt you, I want you to heal, judo-like,
and transform the hurt into momentum
as I will do for you, redirecting pain.
I want someone to travel through life with,
a companion with brains of steel and a
heart of nerves. Hands that know how to
hold a butterfly as well as a blow torch.
I want someone who will indulge my goodness
but not overshadow me, a partner who
manipulates my emotions with caution.
And I want to be worthy of you.
I want you to be able to give it all up,
for me, or for yourself. I want someone
with the capacity to understand me
and the humility to not impose on my freedom
Dakin Memorial Poem
I miss them, flying down the highway,
tears streaming, missing
them. The gaps and holes of a
blanket worn rough and thin, I
miss them. The spaces between
the stars in a midnight sky, the
negative space of loving someone
absent. Unknown, even, never known, not.
The trees on a ridge, a memorial grove, a cabin
of corners. Open to the dawn of new generations, laid
bare. They flew down the highway too, they took
a train. A plane. They met the sky, falling,
creating a gap deep as the Sea of
Cortez. A hole the length of
California. A sea of unfulfilled
love. Impact, collision, tragedy,
intergenerational reckoning, the
recipient of so much that was lost
to others. A melancholy deepened
with brooding of violence and
their misery. Fear of the sky, those
stars, the depth of the lake, the sea,
the richness of the love you
left behind. I miss them.
My own ignorance and short-sighted
young-ness, falling from the sky
happy, blissful, un-aware, yet those tears
spring to the eyes of their friends
before words can still them
before thought can banish them, emotions' well.
I, the pump. You: left living. This, our land.
They are gone. Beauty youth courage generosity
Warm night. Cold sky, focusing
on the bright stars but
noticing the spaces between them and
feeling a cold chill, a
blackness. Pull the blanket close
add another layer and stand close to
those left living. We miss them.
Bonsais and Bristlecones
Three hundred and fifty years of care.
Watered every day: one hundred and thirty thousand
devotions. Roots trimmed eighty times, branches
trained since 1650: fourteen generations.
It's hard to believe the bark doesn't protect a
soul deep in there, encouraged to form through
constant attention, detail, tenderness and discipline.
A helpless dependent, beautiful, gentle, silent.
I've been loved, trained, and watered for ten thousand days,
but occasionally put out in the way of volcanic
instability. I learned to balance in storms of
love-guilt-rage, to fill blackness with light, and
to reassure my consciousness of the continuity of care.
Useful skills, but not ones I want to use every day.
I have a soul and a mind and feet to dance.
Wild-grown trees are vulnerable to other dangerous
inclinations of climate or predation. A six thousand year-old
bristlecone clings to life and survival at twelve
thousand feet, always seeking new extremes.
Internal mechanisms drive motivation for success
In spite of everything. Overcoming harsh challenges, a
stoic cowboy, hypersensitive to changes in weather and
seasons. A life depends on those observations, after all.
Perceptive, responsive, critical, demanding, alone.
The twisted, windswept and tough exterior makes a
strong and luminous surface. But at what internal cost?
Unloved, forgotten, misled, abandoned - you learned to
care for yourself in draughts of shivering clarity. I wonder.
You turn your back on me while I recognize a soul
deep in there: the capacity of understanding, the
sonolumiscence of emotion. The width of the straits
we tried to bridge is measured in the color of childhood skies;
the depth of the white-capped water in caution
fear and hope of slowly softly opening eyes.
Haphazard and dangerous circumstances or the
intentionality of constant but sometimes violent devotion.
A choice: black or white disorder. I'll choose
The next step, now that I know the landscape. Fertile ground
and freedom to allow children to become redwoods:
as strong inside as out, unhindered by passing brushfires.
No more volcanic instability here, no more shipwrecks.
Accept your partner's limitations; leave or stay based on your own.
If I start a bonsai today, will my children remember
those every-day devotions? And their children?
Until 2352: forty two thousand months. It takes a dry
week in the sun to undo everything. Maybe not, and
by 2352 there won't be any more ripples of my beginnings,
or memory triggers to care for a great-great-great
grandmother's plant. But the attention, detail, tenderness and
discipline may then be steps in a dance, moving, spinning forward.
Ease
He reminds me of high deserts and dry winds
Aching mountains and pine nuts
Then there is also the gravity of shadows
And a golden gate bridge. And some other things,
Laughing, forgiveness.
A bunch of tricky Judo moves.
I couldn't recreate them if I tried.
...
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