Through the Looking Glass: (now that you have gone)

Through the looking glass


wind shifts perspectives
raindrops flow in rivulets
obscuring life’s form

Poem for Revival

you can over milk the cow
you can under feed the dog
you can simmer in the now
or get caught up in the fog
when you want to feel the sunshine
but you need to feel the rain
when collapsing draws you inward
and you’re sitting still in pain
just remember there are lessons
even though you’d rather not
be steeped in so much messiness
and stirred up in your pot
oh the shadows they have wisdom
the darkness knows its truth
the wicked are not wicked
they’re just stuck in a phone booth
trying hard to send out messages
but confused about which line
will connect them with “the other”
they weave in and out of time
sometimes you have to listen to
the ones that shake you up
be very still, it’s overdue
you must drink from their cup
you might say it’s retribution
or a master plan of fate
that keeps you stuck and hurting
and makes you isolate
but aint it far more likely
there is reason for distress
through the pain of staying oh so still
you might find a slim egress
still, you think it isn’t easy
you wish it weren’t so
when you feel a little queasy
and it seems there’s far to go
but if you just zip-up the keeper
of the “we know what it is”
let your heart attend it’s beeper
if it’s slow or in a whiz
rest into the unknowing
don’t escape toward left or right
but focus on the glowing
edge of being here tonight.

Eavesdropping

You want to know
how to keep an open
and full heart
when storms ravage entire communities
children starve beneath barren hillsides
random shots slaughter loved ones.

You want to understand
how unharnessed fear
unearths buried compassions.

Be still and listen.
Listen.
Listen
to the whimpering wind,
to vessels growling and abandoned.
Listen
to the whispered farewell,
the wail of the left-behind.

The Journey: a Haiku

Uninvited, breath
sustains and erodes without
judgment or sorrow