Sunday Morning in the Garden

If you tell me that
harvesting beans on Sunday
is not true worship

i will not believe
you. I was on my knees and
my spirit rose up.

Green, 2012

Mountain Goes Down, 2012

Blurry Eyes, 2012

Mist, 2012

Early Spring, 2012

Loss, 2012

Difficult Truths Haiku

Gardening carrots
necessarily means you 
rip up healthy plants.




Some days it takes me
several hours to accept
that I’m still alive.


The sunshine doesn’t
always make me feel happy.
It can make me sad.


I don’t always care
that I track dirt in on my
two bare, filthy feet.


Running away from
things I love is too easy.
That includes people.


Peace is slippery--
slips in when not invited
and then out again.


Hunger goes deeper
than the tongue or the stomach.
It makes my heart ache.


After your dog dies
you pet others, and like them,
but it’s not the same.

Woman at Rest

charcoal

The Market at Macha, Zambia

2006

watercolor

Cape May

Cape May, 2011

pastel

9"X12"

"Cliff" oil on canvas, 4" X6"

"Meditation" oil on panel, 7 3/4" X 7 3/4"

"The Sky's on Fire", oil on canvas, 6" X 6"

Silence

Silence.

What is inside?

Joy

it is {never} enough

When the sun rises I think

to myself that if this were

the last day the sun rises

I would still be glad

because even in the

memory of a dead woman,

it is enough.

When the sun rises I think

to myself that were this

the last day the sun rises

I would sink in despair

because even in the

heart of a grateful woman,

it is never enough.

kirsten's birthday

today is your day.

celebrate, then remember

every day is yours.

Watching Squirrels

If you pretend the mere squirrels are more exotic, like monkeys, and that you've always wanted monkeys in your backyard, then the edge of the lawn becomes a lush jungle playground and you see the magic of where you live.

Those squirrels might be fighting, or loving, but they are scrambling and leaping in any case, and making noises they usually only make when they think no one is around to listen in. i put down my coffee cup and my book long enough to watch them ascend and descent (and transcend?) the tree trunks, their long bodies and tails flowing the curves of the wood, like Maserati on a stock-still interstate-- a flash of sleek speed. But no, forget the car metaphor, because they've already driven away to someone else's jungle.

Apart

I sit apart.

In many ways

I find I do not fit

in the puzzle of

humanity.

I observe from a

different place

and empathize,

comprehend,

but do not identify.

I hold myself

when no one else

will hold me.

It is enough.

But the magnet of love

pulls, pulls, pulls,

and sometimes hurts.