Days That Will Not Come Again

 

Where there was something and suddenly isn't
- a beach, a forest, the song of the surf,
the crash of waves on shore,
sunset sinking below the horizon,
running through the wild world 
with a big black laughing dog -
absence becomes a presence
that fits into a corner of our hearts.
Heart walls expand to make room
for the memories, watered with tears,
that come, unbidden, at random moments.
There is an ache, a missing, that feels 
almost as strong as the presence did,
for we are remembering Joy
from a place of less-than-joy.
We are remembering love
from a place of loss-of-the-beloved.
We are remembering companionship
and feeling the pining of our solitary soul.

Where there was something and suddenly isn't
we have to work hard to
remember gratitude, recognize enough-ness,
look up at the sky and trail
the eagle's flight with our eyes,
seek out riversong or a place of salt and sea.
We somehow learn to make a space for sorrow
inside our aching chests,
and place our love and remembering there,
glad that we recognized joy
and fullness of soul when we had it,
though everything after has been muted,
tinted grey and sepia,
compared to those golden,
radiant, long-gone wild
wilderness days
that will never,
     will not ever
         come again.



The two italicized lines are from Naomi Shihab Nye's poem Burning the Old Year .

Sharing this at  What's Going On,  where Sumana's prompt on Wednesday is Memory / Remembering.

Insignificant

 

The small things I do to help the earth

feel so insignificant, compared to

what needs to be done - especially

when the worst corporate offenders

are doing nothing.

The poems I write - pleas sent out

into the universe (which hears them) -

do little good, when world leaders,

corporations, the offensively wealthy,

cling to capitalism, even at the price

of every other living being's survival.

And yet we keep on keeping on

because giving up is not an option,
even when

scientific voices grow more urgent,

because we love the earth, and

what we love we try to save.

And because what we save

saves us.

For  Rajani's climate series. 

A message I have written about before but it doesn't hurt to repeat it.

HYMN OF PRAISE

 

Chris Lowther photo

Wind whispers

through the canopy

like lake ripples

through the trees

Small leaves spiral

thick as raindrops,

pixies dancing

on the breeze

Sunlight consecrating trees -

almost I hear an organ sound:

I, pilgrim and acolyte,

the golden forest

hallowed ground

Birch bark like ancient manuscript

writ by a gnarled and pointy hand

tells tales of olden times long-gone,

bygone days upon the land

Once again, the breeze-song swells,

upon the wind a hymn of praise:

to these blessed simple days,

these days we have,

a hymn of praise.

***

Praise the amber sunlight in late afternoon,
burnishing the forest golden.
Praise the eagle,
swooping twice overhead.
When I called out to her, "Beautiful!"
she fluttered her wingtips at me
in response.

Praise the stately cherry trees out front,
who have shed their leaves,
going into their winter sleep,
who will burst forth
in white and tender blossoms
next spring.

Praise Brother Bear, his big paw
reaching into the river
in search of one last salmon
before his winter nap.
And praise Sister Wolf,
who is teaching her cubs
the forest trails
and how to find their hidden den.

Praise those who are caring for
the suffering, in impossible situations,
under a bomb-filled sky,
and praise those who are trying
to find a way to bring this horror
to a merciful end.
(May all killing stop. Praise be.)

Praise our peaceful day
on this side of the world,
with which we mend our tattered hearts,
so we can hold this aching world
and bear what is too heavy to lift,
because what we care about,
we try to save,
and what we save
saves us.

Praise what we can,
in this world so full of pain
and heartbreaking beauty.
May Mother Earth receive our love
and carry it on winds of change
across the sky
to silence and still
the guns and bombs,
the inhumanity
of war.

***

"In certain ways, writing is a form of prayer." Denise Levertov. The first poem came to me as I was walking a forest trail. I sped up, to get to my car and paper and pen before I forgot the words. The second is a praise poem, inspired by "Praise Song" by Barbara Crooker.

Heart Broken Open

 

source

How would we be to each other,

if we knew we are each one small piece

of the broken heart of the world?

This must be why we wake up aching,

why, when everything around us

is beautiful beyond reckoning,

our hearts still feel broken inside us,

because the world is hurting

and we are the ones who cause it,

and the only ones who can heal it.

Today I will stand at the edge of the sea,

next stop, Japan - such vastness.

I will count the oystercatchers on the rocks.

Maybe an eagle will perch so close

I can see its feathers, it regarding me

with its imperial eye, me humble,

passing gently so as not to disturb.

Why can we not pass this gently,

have this same regard,

for our fellow humans?

How would we be to each other,

if we knew that we each

are one small piece

of the broken heart of the world?

The idea of each of us being one small part of the broken heart of the world comes from Mark Nepo, who taught this concept at a writing workshop recently.

This Morning, Out My Window

 

This morning,
out my window,
the sky is becoming its day face,
after the long, dark night.

Just so, looking up,
does my heart expand
and take a circle or two
above the trees:
joyous, expansive,
above all of the cacophony
of humans being less
than we should be to each other.

My heart, a wise old owl,
perched on a cedar bough;
a raven with its gobble-cry;
a heron, skinny matron,
purse clutched under her wing.

The heavy stones in my heart
called grief,
called war,
the human-caused suffering
of all beings,
the accelerating climate crisis,
(ignored, because we are distracted
by the bombing):
I lay them down in the River of Solitude,
then walk on to the sea:
take refuge in
the eternal waves
that will be here long after
you and me.

My wish: that the great sky above
cover the entire globe
with peace; where
no bombs fall,
and all who suffer
find the healing, help and hope
they need.

A big wish. 

THINGS I HAVE LOVED

 

Me and Pup - the Dog of Joy
(He was jumping for a treat!)

The sky, ever-changing in colour and mood,

in sun, in starshine, in midnight moons.

The river wild, remembering my old

wolf-dog's eyes looking helplessly at me
as the current caught him,

and he started drifting away,
me getting ready to

plunge in after him, till an outcropping 

caught him, returning him to me.

For I have loved him best
in this world.

I have loved mornings, the certain smell

at the farm that takes me back to

summer mornings as a child; and that

golden time in late afternoon, when 

the light changes and turns the trees

to amber; and that smell - petrichor -

just before the first drops of rain,

when once more I am back in childhood,

listening to a thunderstorm
in the back room of the cottage
on Christleton Avenue

with my Grandma.

Sunrises and sunsets, which I miss 

in my elder years, because I am always

still tired, when I wake up, and
too tired at day's end.

But I remember, I remember, skies

that looked like the floor of heaven,

me sitting on a log, wondering

if the one I loved loved me.

He didn't, but my wolf-dog did;

he showed me how love was
meant to be.

I love tiny purple crocuses 

out on the lawn, brave forerunners,
as spring tiptoes in,

just waiting to spread her skirts

of white blossoms across 

the two old cherry trees
in the yard. I love summers,

sitting out front in the sun, and rocking,
watching the world walking by
with its children and dogs and canes.
I love when they wave and I wave back.

I love the big window through which

I watch the changing skies and seasons.
Sometimes an eagle swoops past,
sometimes a skinny heron
perches in a topmost tree.

I love that last Valentine's Day

I woke up to discover

someone unknown had taped small hearts

all across  the front windows - love,

to make a stranger smile.

I love the orange gerberas

on my desk, with their black eyes,
brightening this rainy day

as I ponder the winter ahead
with its indoor comforts.

I love ancient old growth: thick weathered

trunks and old man's beard,
moss and lichen,

and feeling in the forest like I once did

long ago at morning mass:
silent, peaceful,
reverential.

I love long sandy shores stretching

to forever, and the way my wolf dog and I 

walked them, wildly, joyously
for years; never again
would I feel so whole, so free,

after he was gone from me.

I love the beauty of the world,
the true, good hearts of animals, and
what is best in humanity,
when people bring their open hearts
to helping others
in times of trouble.
Times when we puny humans
reach deep within,
and connect with something deeper,
something bigger
than ourselves
that is called Love.

So much love keeps my heart
full to the brim
on any given day,
and I know that
I have been very lucky
in this life; I have been
gifted and blessed
in every single way.

For Mary's prompt at What's Going On? LOVE. What the world needs now. 

Between Here and There

 

This poem is a bridge between here and there,

between trouble and peace. I write to

find my way to what lies beneath:

the bigger story in which my small

human journey is contained.

I didn't mean to carry so much:

the heavy lift of helping others

carry their own burdens;
the weight of a world in freefall:
people at war with each other,
at war with the planet itself.
One grows old

before we learn to travel light.

My head wakes every morning

to, first, the weather, what kind of day

it is, indoors or walking weather.

Then the news rushes in, the horrors

that happened overnight while 

I was sleeping; the insane antics 

of people wanting to govern the world

who are unable to govern themselves.

My poems are an effort to sweep the path,

make a clear space in my thoughts, the better to

breathe in the peace of Mother Ocean,

walk in the greenly Sister Forest, eyes

following the flight of birds above,

in the clear air - the most fortunate of beings,

who do not know of war, who are content

with simply Being.

My teachers: waves, the wild ones, trees.

A simplicity that brings me to my knees.

A Wild Writing poem sparked by Mark Nepo's unpublished poem "At Gate 3, in August." The italicized lines are his.