But we have music
When I saw Laurie Doctor’s poem in two alphabets yesterday, it reminded me of what emerged at choir this week. Laurie is a gifted calligrapher, painter,…
Ashes of love
I own precious few family heirlooms. One I treasure is a worn black leather-bound pocket-sized ledger filled with poems. It first belonged to my great-aunt Nan,…
This is not a bell
This is not a cowbell. It is a story wrapped in a linen shirt and carried from the old world into the new. It is origin.…
Burning contracts
BURNING CONTRACTS after Naomi Shihab Nye Promises consume themselves in a quick hot flash. Contracts imposed when I didn’t understand I could say no. Artless paper…
Blessing for the path
I didn’t know, when I went to Ireland, that my primary reason for going was to visit John O’Donohue’s grave. Who could know such a thing?…
The sky above my mother’s house
If healing means to make whole, as Michael Meade claims, then what part of me is missing? I have a hole in my chest a mile…
The stories we carry
I was several years into my 40s before I could forgive my mother for being herself. Seeing her so vulnerable now, it feels terrible to admit…
Finding joy without even lookin’ for it
You know those days when everywhere you turn the same idea confronts you, breathes itself into your ear, blares out from the television set, slides into…
Married to amazement: Imagine!
Last night I attended a memorial for one of our community’s beloved elders. Nancy Sterritt was my sister’s auntie, and she died in her 97th year,…
Your website can go viral
I haven’t posted for a while, but seeing as it’s national poetry month, here’s a poem I wrote entirely from spam comments left on my blog.…