that's mrs. mediocrity to you

A week of too much that left me longing for balance. The scales are always tipping, on way or another, and we do this dance, don’t we, to keep ourselves in the game.

Too much work, too much rain, and a tiny tornado touch-down one road over… and yet, here I am, still standing, still hoping, still growing.

Resiliency is a beautiful thing. All the ups and downs are connected, somewhere.

The birds are still singing.

And here we are, in a brand new, fresh-washed now.

I look out my window and think: lush.

Too much is just abundance looked at crosswise. Or vice versa.

There.

I wrote my way to a smile.

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and freshly fallen rain

passing through on its way
to far-off places

leaving sparkling bits of fractured light
and splashed up drops
of holy water

to reflect a laundered sky
gone back to blue

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purple is the shape
of letting go

and blue is the beginning
of sacrifice

all the scars and torn edges
faded blooms and broken stems

form the canvas of whole
and the soft brush of plenty

as gold fills every sky
with perseverance

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A sun-filled birdsong morning, windows open and purple flowers, light filtering into every shadow. June is such a busy-bee month, I have to remind myself to stop and smell the roses, literally. My first cup of tea in the garden at dawn is my meditation, my morning pages, my daily gratitude. I drink it down and always, wish for another.

I find myself in getting-stuff-done mode, as if finally my body and my mind have both come to life after winter’s lack of ambition. I am like a plant, a tree, a flower. I need the sun on my skin and the birds to sing me awake in order to grow.

I reach for the sky and it’s there, right there, at the tips of my fingers, day and night.

And it’s enough.

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and it’s the magic of twilight that draws me outside, down the hill to a swamp filled with peepers. some nights the sound roars through the darkness, and on those nights, it’s not that i can’t sleep, it’s just that i don’t want to. my primal memory wants to lie outside and count the starts into numbers too large to carry. my feet refuse to forget the sensation of walking. nothing is clear in the darkness, but everything shines, and until you’ve let the moon find your shadow, you’ve never once stood in real light. there are secrets out here, everywhere. the trees are always whispering. i want to walk into the forest and do nothing but listen. that’s where all the answers are, but we’ve forgotten how to hear them. lightning reminds us, but only for a moment. and thunder makes us forget yet again. i want to wash my hair in the rain and leaves my toes caked with mud. i want to run through the color of midnight.

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yesterday my cat
dropped a grackle at my feet
alive, but injured

and i tried to save it
(to no avail)

i lifted it gently and
placed it beneath the yellow
lilies, offering shelter and
food and water and also
a projection of hope

and the bird looked up at me
frightened and resigned,
and then together, we waited

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later, i carried the body
away and noticed, in the way
humans do,
that it was heavier in death
than in life

as if its spirit had somehow
managed to counteract gravity,
at least a little

and i realized
we have it all wrong,
this thing called grief
our underlying fear
of being forgotten

because the world
always remembers

it’s just that we
finally

 forget ourselves

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I took this photo a few weeks ago, and it made me laugh, Mr. Grackle looking all fierce.

I’d like to think that’s the look he’s giving NaughtyKitten™ just now.

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and coming away with a handful of air.

Isn’t that they way of things, always? But we never let it stop us, and that is the magic, the miracle, of living.

To be human is to struggle, and it’s an ongoing battle, this existence, even when skies are blue. And that’s what keeps us going, that’s what makes us whole, the dark and the light, night and day, sun and moon, babe and crone.

It’s so easy to forget that we need all of it, the shade and the shadow, the hunger and the hurt, the fear and the frustration, all the parts we’d rather hide or ignore or bury, because nature, human or otherwise, will always strive for balance.

And we, as humans, would like to think ourselves out of the equation, we want to rise above, to banish the things that weigh us down, without accepting the fact that these are the very things that keep us grounded. Without them, we would simply float away.

The size and the beauty of the bloom are determined underground, in the darkness of the soil that anchors us.

Roots, air, water, light, earth, growth. It’s a package deal.

And just look how beautifully it’s wrapped.

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days when i do nothing
but listen

moving my body in the rhythm
of nurture

i care for you and
together we grow

remembering the mirror
i’ve forgotten

wisdom matters less
than sun on skin

i break a bloom off
with one brown shoulder

a mistake to remind me
of gentle

and whisper my apology
to wind

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in the style

of me

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“You can’t ‘just’ be a poet—which when rent is due is absolutely true—therefore we get pretend titles like Ambassador and Legislator and Seer. The upside is that we are free (or, downside, forced) to find or invent roles for ourselves (and our poems) that engage differently with the material demands of our culture.”~Mark Bibbins

I came across this quote yesterday, after a conversation the evening before with my husband about the paths we take and why we take them, and whether or not we regret them, or at the very least, wish we’d done things differently.

This is something I’ve thought about a lot recently, as I find myself aging, as I lose friends and loved ones, as I traverse the territory of middle-age that stands between now and crone. And I find myself, quite often, wishing I had done just that. Except then I realize that I did do everything differently, without thought, without choice even, because my path was never the one paved with asphalt and fancy construction, my path was always just a break in the trees somewhere in the woods, and I was always the barefoot girl staring wide-eyed at the moon.

So, okay, no regrets, but there are still things that haunt me. And the older I get, the more security becomes one of them, the more struggling looks less romantic and simply hard. The more I wonder if I should have put some high heels on all those years ago and walked down a different road, wearing a suit that might confine, but would also protect. I was a straight-A student my whole life. I could have done anything. (At least that’s what the little voice whispers.)

But the voice that always answers back, the one that’s stronger and sing-song and slightly rose-colored, tells a different story. That I could only ever have done exactly what I did. I could only ever be who I am. And that is my solace.

Will it be enough to see me through?

Only time will tell, and besides, the sun is shining down on these roses about to bloom and a few years back, this whole bush was crushed to the ground. I see no regret in these buds that turn themselves boldly towards the sun, and the thorns and the scars are all hidden just now, in the darkest shadows of growth.

I’ll sit here and watch them open and listen to the birds and inhale all the yesterdays that brought me to this moment.

And all I’ll breathe out is today.

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