Staying Still

You promised yourself that you would remain calm today.

You told yourself that when the clock hit its middle hours,

a span when you cannot seem to stay focused,

a time when you aren’t sure what to do with yourself,

you would just stop.

You would focus on

your breath

coming

in and out.

You would sit with the uncertainty, as if it were a rambunctious puppy.

You would feel the weight of the puppy and watch it squirm.

There now, see how easy it is just to

STOP

and

breathe

in

and

out

and

stay

put?

If you do anything,

go into the Sounds True app on your phone

and listen to spritual teacher Eckert Tolle talk about the

the “Power of Now,” or listen to

Buddhist nun Pema Chodron discuss

“Learning to Stay Present.”

Or tune in to teacher Jack Kornfield lecture on

“The Power of Meditation.”

In the end, they are all talking

about doing the same thing: holding steady

in the only moment we ever have,

this one,

when the sun is eclipsed by milky grey

clouds and flowers are looking slightly wilted

and the lawn is burned in places to a brown crisp.

That moment is gone and now a new one is

Here: that puppy is now five years old and she is

lying so comfortably on the carpet at your feet.

WHEN DID LIFE GET SO HARD RICHARD?

In the dark my father lies in his recliner chair ALL DAY ALL NIGHT

FRIGHTENED ANGRY SAD.

He lies there and he lies there

and he stares and stares and moans AND GROANS

“HOW DO I END MY LIFE?”

My sister sends the text message to me:

“…last night Dad was up between 4:00 and 5:00 a.m. and he kept saying:

‘oh I want this to end, how do I end my life?’”

DEAR GOD I BEG YOU FOR HELP AS WE, DAD AND HIS LOVED ONES, ARE TRYING TO ENDURE THIS MISERY OF HIS.

HOW CAN I PROTECT MYSELF FROM THE ENERGY THAT FUELS
MY DAD AS HE IS DENYING DECRYING FULMINATING AGAINST LIFE?

ART ART ART I AM SO GRATEFUL for

ART SAVES ME EVERY DAY

Poetry painting music photography

And flower gardens and dogs and babies and sweet birds chirping too.

Mary says I can tell him this:

“Dad I AM GOING TO LIVE FOR YOU AND FOR ME!”

And so I feel it, the life force, I feel it

in my chest rising with my breath, in my arms tingling, energy sliding up and down.

I OFFER UP MY POETRY ON

THIS ALTAR OF GR-ART-ITUDE

I AM SO SO GRATEFUL FOR

POETRY AS IT HELPS ME FEEL ALIVE ALIVE ALIVE!

Writing  a poem 

HELPS ME ERASE

THE SOUND OF HIS DEADLY WORDS.

INSTEAD, I WRAP MYSELF AROUND AND AROUND

In the sound of my own words of gratitude,

Thanking God for the blue sky and clean air and sunshine and every bit of nature --

right there outside my window is a chipmunk flittering across the same white limestone rocks where yesterday I saw a woodchuck. A few minutes later, a deer dances across the thick green meadow.

ART HELPS FILL YOUR HEAD WITH BEAUTY MAKES YOU FEEL

the miracles all around.

DAD, once upon a time, did art when he built things out of wood, for  years he could magically produce 

wonderful furniture and toys and knickknacks he designed.

He even built the first house I grew up in.

And then three or four years ago when he couldn’t see well enough to cut wood anymore

He made dozens of clever things out of layers of cardboard, glued tightly together.

WHEN EXACTLY DID LIFE GET SO HARRRRRD FOR YOU RICHARD?

I humbly pray that there may be a miracle for him, and for us all,

that Dad may find peace as he ends his days.

If I could, I would show you Dad that there is a divine majesty and mystery

in this moment and this one and now this one and that and that.

STAY IN THE PRESENT MOMENT, BE GRATEFUL FOR ALL YOUR BLESSINGS

LET ALL YOUR SENSES STAY TUNED TO LIFE.

Focus on your breath and your heart beating, realize the magical and miraculous and extraordinary in ordinary everyday life.

It’s time now, Dad, I’m about to go do my exercises and go for a walk, I will carry you with me today, I will hold you in my heart while I sit here and stand there and lie there and be here, praying all day!

July 18, 2019, one week exactly before my dad turns 93 years old on July 25^th.

Thank You Uni-verse

How do you write a poem when you feel like a totally blank page?

What do you do when your emotions have been swallowed up by the wind?

You dip into the memory bin and recall a single red clover. Twice

last week while you were jogging, you saw that flower sitting

alone in a shaft of sunlight. It stopped you. It brought a smile.

And on another run, you saw that bright red and black bird.

You think it was a scarlet tanager - exciting because it’s rare for this area.

And then this morning, while you were doing your exercises

beside the meadow,

you saw a coyote streak after a tiny fawn just a few feet away

from where you lay doing leg lifts.

At top speed the animals dashed into the thick underbrush.

You screamed, fearing for the fawn.

But a few moments later, the tiny deer

emerged, unscathed. A few moment

after that, a doe sauntered into the meadow, and headed

in the direction where the fawn had gone.

You like to think that mother and baby were reunited quickly.

You like to think too that you can write whenever you want to.

But you can’t count on it. All you can do is sit here, staring out

the window into the forest. All you can do is stare at the orange lilies and

the red bee balm and the purple cone flower. All you can do is write

what you see and hope to be inspired by it.

At least, by writing it down, you’re creating a record.

It is something like sending a thank you note to the

universe, for sending life your way. 

Two Drops of Ink publishes my poem, "Out Loud"

Two Drops of Ink, an on-line literary blog, has published my poem, "Out Loud," which begins this way:

There stands a fat robin

on the limestone rocks

outside the window.

And on the tip of the 

highest branch of

the peach tree

sits a hummingbird

that rises to do

a sky dance and then

settles back down again. 

There now is

a rusty red fox so casually

trotting down the

driveway into the 

forest of words on my page.

To read more, go to Two Drops of Ink.