December - Poem 16
Hail To the Jewel In the Lotus / Kate Bowers
Om Mani Padme Hom
For Jeffrey
A young lama at the mouth of a cave
Meets a marmot sheltering there from snow.
“You are the jewel in the lotus,” says he.
The marmot whistles first with bravado,
Because he has fear and no human speech
For this lama kneeling at the cave’s mouth.
The young lama bows to the marmot’s heart
Opens his own heart light forward, a red thread
Connecting two jewels from the same flower.
Now one, illusion falls away between them.
The marmot reaches beyond the mouth, paw
Tender in the jeweled hand of the lama.
Marmots are not loved by those who have lawns
And fruit trees wild creatures do love to eat.
Lotus Eaters do not see them as jewels.
Lotus Eaters are not lamas on a mountain
But could be across well-kept lawns if they
Listened at the their own cave’s mouth, the lama
Heart there singing “You are the same jewel.”
Sick Bed / Katie Collins
My stomach is empty,
But even water finds a ways
To eject itself from my system
My only hope is to keep all the mess in my spare trash can
Because if I have to smell bleach right now
It’s over
I’ve been biting my tongue
And swallowing every unkind thought
For far too long
It all had to come back up eventually.
Train of Pain / Ellen Ferguson
You filmed me talking
You asked if you could
I misunderstood
A train of pain
Passed through this town.
Nothing to see here, folks.
Words: that’s the problem.
Not the record,
The words.
Record of an artist’s mind at work / Chris Fong Chew
A record spins / crackling to life /
through tube amplifiers / sound radiates /
as pencil to paper / grinds at the tip /
marks filling / the blank sheet /
inscribing meaning / onto the page /
both truth / and lies / crafted worlds /
deconstructed phrases / this record /
recorded / recoded / imagined /
re-imagined / a world / where /
there is / dystopia / utopia / fictional /
creation / a different / reality / recording /
the artist’s mind / recording the artist’s /
work / truth be told / lies be told /
only the world itself / will know.
Growth-grabbing / Davis Hicks
Ivy- sprawling, that grabbing
reach for something warmer,
something higher.
I can understand that.
Who wouldn’t want to reach, to develop
a sense of presence
in such a kind place as gardens?
Or, perhaps more honestly,
grasping at the edges of supermarkets and movie theaters,
bread and circuses.
Clawing up the billboard’s unmanned post, snagging at skinless torso,
grabbing all
unused space.
Either way,
everything is green, the tired
and forgotten both-
all things compostable.
Vines grope with arcane fingers,
ever searching for anything resembling
themselves.
Bedrock / Victor Barnuevo Velasco
If blasting bedrock were a metaphor,
I would argue for rain. Not the gentle
drizzle that accumulates into tiny
streams and then into mirrors
of clouds on the ground, when
the sky clears. No, not that.
I wish for a sudden cloudburst --
the sky surging: birds descending
as fishes, fishes landing as humans
with arms stretched wide, mouth open,
tongue out for a sacred communion
with what once was beneath them.
This is the foundation of our being --
we are made of water. Water
does not understand borders. Not
the lines on paper, the invisible
divide in mountains, or what is
under our feet. It tracks its own
paths: leaps off cliffs, tunnels bedrock.
Swelters our labor and tears our grief.
Too many hats (and a juggling act. ) / Jen Wagner
I got home and walked through my front door.
I removed my shoes and placed them on the floor.
I took off my hat
And my hat
And my hat.
Hung now.
So my head is free.
(Though my hair is flat)
All the balls I used to juggle
are now in my pocket.
I removed those too and placed them next to me in a basket.
I never realized how many there were before.
As I kept them effortlessly
(Or so it seemed)
Flying through the air.
The full plate that I carried with me that day was stacked neatly.
Now in a pile.
And for once I could see
How many full plates
I kept spinning.
Recklessly.
You don’t know
what you don’t know.
Until you can see.
And what I see so plainly now…
Is that most of those things didn’t even belong
To
Me.
Say it Like You Mean It / Stacy Walker
There is a difference
Between caring
About your feelings,
And managing –
Feeling –
Them for you.
I can’t always find it.
I try to teach
My daughter
Kindness
Without losing
Her sense of self,
Of who she is,
Empathy,
Without merging
Into others.
The thing is,
She already knows,
Mostly living
In a space of love
And boundaries,
My reminders
Only seldom
Supporting her stance.
Still, I see moments,
Where she pauses,
Considers choosing
Them.
Then my words,
Catch in my throat,
Knowing I’m teaching
What I haven’t learned,
Giving sound advice,
That’s hollow in my belief,
A part of me
Still afraid
Of letting your feelings free,
Taking them for myself,
Wrapping my hands around the reins
Of your life,
Sure that not only your safety
Is at stake,
But my own.
The little girl inside
Still believes
This is the way
And I wonder
If my child
Feels the same,
My hopes and fears
Passed from my bones
To hers,
And now in how we live, too.
So I know,
I have to let go;
Choose me
So she can choose her.
