Finding Home

Peace is not something you can chase, or even catch. And yet, I pursue it the way an arid wanderer chases a mirage, the distance between them constant, a lesson in profitless pursuits.

Today was my last day attending a 7 week workshop with a local famous poet. When things end, I usually need to know where I am headed next, a sign on the highway telling me the next destination is x number of miles ahead. I detest uncertainty, even more than brussel sprouts or a superficial personality.

Between mothering a 20 month old and working part-time as a healer, I ask too many questions about writing. Am I any good? Do I want to publish? Do I even have time for revisions to call myself a writer? A weight within strains my heart and pounds on my back as if someone is knocking on me to open something.

As I am walking to my car, another writer, one whose work I am quite fond of, hears me exhale my jumbled thoughts as they trip over each other to introduce themselves. She replies with a clarity and confidence I borrow temporarily, till the full measure of meaning can be claimed as my own.

‘You are perceptive.’

A simple phrase, yet stronger than any religion, personal advice, or self-help book. An unshakeable faith, the porch light on when I’m lost and want to come home.

The Gift

I refuse to be a useless woman-
talents beaten and broken
by tides of neglect,
bits of shells the only remnants
of my former glory.
I plan to be amazing my whole life.
A whole seashell. A continuous whisper
of the sea’s wisdom heard
above the cacophonous drone
of human conversation.
A story of a woman
bruised by experience,
healed by questions asked
and answers given
to strangers passing by.

Making Room

Her eyes are oceans where I release
my beauty and bullshit together –
my sweet song floating
as my real thoughts drown.
On my lap, she drinks her milk
and watches me intently,
opening my 6th chakra wider
than my mouth or cervix
have ever stretched in ecstasy
or childbirth. In this moment,
I’m singing and smiling for
my little girl, and mourning the death
of an independent woman
like a well loved relative or friend.
I’m grateful for dualities in Motherhood-
two faces, one coin, one woman
not having to pick sides.

If Thoughts Were Leaves

brown leaves
crumpled thoughts
fall away
empty neurons
sleeping in winter
new veins, synapses
spring to life
green leaves
take a chance
lazy summer
who cares
about falling

*****

It feels so good to write again, to write in my own way, with my own voice, completely uncensored. My greatest gift to my readers (and myself), is my ability to take my life's lessons and write about them in a meditational style, one that implies words and thoughts hiding between the ones you see, the depth of emotions we feel but only show with a few tears or a small smile.

I am home again.