Today I freed a black-eyed Susan
from a vine.
The slight tendril twisted about
the flower’s stalk, bending the plant
in a long, dreary arch toward the ground.
It is a small thing, to set a flower free.
In the great cycle of a forest’s growth
and decay, I do not know if it matters.
I do know this black-eyed Susan
now feels the sun on its face
instead of its back,
it no longer hovers over
brown leaf litter but
bobs under the blue of the sky.
And for this moment, my
breath comes easy.
image by Casey Barber
Under the luminous moon
of the equinox, I travel this
quiet New England byway.
Behind me, a small possum sits
in a twist of brush and bramble.
She’s praising Something
– herself, fate, or God -
for running the gauntlet
of my tires; how she did it
is a question for minds
bigger than hers or mine.
Yet I’ve told her story out of turn:
First were frantic breaths
and heaving tremors
as she recalled her maze of terror:
the swirling black teeth,
the cold asphalt on her pads,
the shocking graze of metal against
her coarse coat.
.
It's a shame that possums
are solitary animals.
No one was there, watching
wide-eyed and breathless;
No one was there, applauding
the blind luck and dumb moves
that got her to the other side.
I drive on.
North of me, at the end of another road,
a dark sentinel gazes into blackness;
where horizon meets the sea,
Cadillac Mountain waits for the sun.
I return.
It's pre-dawn, fourth of July;
you slumber in your sleeping bag
as I pass under festive banners
on my way to the trail.
I stumble up the mountain
to wait for the sunrise, my soul
bounding and rebounding
against your world’s low atmosphere.
I arrive in the final opaque moments;
others are here too:
in pairs in groups in close proximity.
We wait, and I wrap my arms
around myself.
There was nothing I could do
to stop that certain light;
the urge to bolt seized like a spasm,
and I tumbled across, blind and careless,
careening into coldness,
into tangle, into truth.
No one saw me when I crossed over;
the clapping I heard was not for me,
but for the first rind of light that sent
shimmers across the waters.
I sat, far into the new day,
breathing the air
and blinking at the light.
That night,
while everyone watched fireworks,
I embraced Independence Day.
In loving memory of Iva LaRue
As the Israelites traveled through the desert wilderness, the presence of God was manifest in a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. Exodus 13:22
In the summer of 1982
God sat at a card table,
poodles at her ankles,
cocked cigarette in hand,
setting her nine cards
in vast array.
The summer of '82
was slow and hot and humid,
and we traveled through
the days card by card,
pacing ourselves by
trumpeted proclamations
Let’s Make a Deal!
Wheeeeeel ooofff Fortune!
and the whispers of
Luke and Laura.
When the news ended,
when the last card played,
when the air was thick and stale,
and we were tired of each other,
I trudged away, smelling of smoke,
and entered my
quiet house. If anyone
was there, they knew
I had been with God.
Every morning, I’d return,
crossing the wasteland,
my house to God’s,
to sit before the altar
of three channels
and eat toast to
the happy banter of others
Good Morning, America.
The incense of tobacco,
bright and fragrant,
rose into the crisp
morning air, air
cleansed by the
light of the moon.
Sometimes God thundered
about daughters-in-law.
Sometimes God quaked
about the silent phone line,
the boys who seldom called.
Sometimes God wept
for the sins of the family,
and sometimes God spoke
in a still small voice,
It’s going to be ok, honey
Oh baby, I’m so very sorry
An ember by night,
the Cloud of Presence by day,
In the wandering wilderness
of that season,
God Was.
Photo art by Tom Branch
Letting go is like
Letting go of honey,
or letting go of dirt
under your fingernails after
an afternoon in the garden
Letting go is like
dropping a hot-handled skillet,
the imprint bubbled into your palm.
Or it is like lingering.
It is losing the scent
from a lover’s pillow.
It is the slow melt.
It is marking each labored breath
while feeling the planet’s rotation
under your feet.
Letting go is like blowing
a dandelion into the wind,
a contrary wind,
that whisks tiny tailed wisps
up your nostrils
under your eyelids
and into your ears.
Letting go is artless wretchedness.
There’s no beauty in it:
It is a roll in the mud and
a stumble through the briars.
But when you emerge,
your dented grace
and seedling peace
will be enough.
I boarded the plane
and looked out the window.
Slipdown rain rivulets
crisscrossed the blank-faced pane.
Beyond, stark trees shook limbs
at the cold, grey sky.
Your prickle sting goodbye
buzz lingered on my lips;
My one-way boarding pass
tight crumpled in my palm.
Square wheels against cobblestone
shuddered down the runway;
With a rasping roar
the plane lifted into the air.
I lifted up, up, up,
slicing through shifting fog
and heavy clouds. Above
the filamentous terra firma,
I shade down
slammed the sun.
