Father wanted quiet,
it wasn’t supposed to be a big deal,
but I was full of play and couldn’t be stopped,
so he backhanded me to the floor.

With every strike I lost a small portion of play allotted me by life,
until the hitting years slowly wore themselves out,
and I grew angry enough to hit back.

I was expert at hiding,
making myself even smaller than I already was,
so quiet I could never be found out.

Now all I want to do is build dancing looms
that unfurl beauty - unkempt, inappropriate, unwelcomed,
things that can’t be unseen,
that must be celebrated.

Violence is the inability to see into the soul of things.

I have become a remedy for that.

We’re camped out in the living room,
me bedded down on the floor,
Daughter taking the high ground of the couch.

We live in the fine style of daily adventures,
be they at home or in the wilds of the world.

Plates click against each other, cabinets close in the kitchen,
Son is making himself a midnight dinner,
because the first was not enough for a lanky 18 year old body.

Time to nourish himself in a silent house,
being his own man,
held by the bounty owed the young.
He still grunts like an animal
when he comes across an especially satisfying bite.

Daughter blessed me with the elder stuffy,
the grandfather of her crew,
my guardian monster.
I’ll wake and sleep, wake and sleep, 
as Dog and Cat, poke at me with bored interest,
dishes land in the sink,
the great slumber ship wends
its way,
slowly,
to a blurry sunrise.

She started this playdate 13 years ago when she first arrived,
never a breath without seeking joy,
even through the sudden shocks of childhood,
and the great, endlessly echoing loss of Mother.

His meals are a reminder that he’ll leave home soon,
and she and I will continue this playdate until it’s her time to make midnight bites and remember
when an old man who cuddled stuffed animals was her best adventure friend.

Keep your soul restless,
don’t stop glancing down the path you didn’t take.

I’ve walked high desert game trails
without any notion of arriving -
signs of Rabbit and Fox,
Juniper offerings, rare Cottonwood stands blessed by
perfumes only these places know how to weave into the breeze,
so honied, ancient, and awakening
you can never convince the uninitiated they exist.

I don’t need to know what I’m yearning for,
just that it keeps me walking,
every step along this snaking way is my yes to the eternal invitation.

Not because I’m wise,
but because I’m still hungry
seduced by this place of becoming.

Endless,
restless
lover.

Fear burrows into me,
a cavalcade of millipedes
chewing at the edge of my spirit.
Rocks gather in my belly.
I’m sinking,
porous,
cadaverous.

Maybe a few of us can conquer fear,
but none can outrun it.
I entice it to pass me over,
touching the softness that lays beneath.

I’ve never been crippled by fear,
but it’s robbed me of seeing the light wrap around my children's faces
and receiving the warmth of their hands
as we shelter from winds that crush everything.

Together we find waves that are still buoyant,
fear becomes a memory,
until it isn’t,
again.

The only way I’ve been able to become big for us,
is to let myself be small,
drift down below fears chattering ivory mandibles,
and listen for the first song of the day,
sung somewhere by voices
that know us all.

This too shall pass, they sing.

This too shall pass.

Moon spoke to me last night,
full in the blackness,
almost no stars sitting with it,
the master of stillness.

Moon told me a story about acceptance and arriving here.
I’d lost faith in falling,
forgetting that weightlessness could be a good thing.
Moon teaches us that over and over again,
drifting through what isn’t,
roped to us,
our small lover.	

My family has been running from the fires
while they do their work,
eating everything that’s ripe,
and sometimes, everything else too.

We can’t live without Fire,
but it has its own way,
its own blessed magic to make.

I have so many teachers around me all the time,
I forget to trust them,
let them work their wisdom over me.

When it’s safe again,
my family and I will sit around a small fire
remembering how generous it is,
and how much we love the Moon,
arriving together in stillness.

How a willowy fawn picks her way through dense leaves and brush
trailing Mother,
so carefully,
finding a quiet, true path.

The way river water is always talking
following grooves scraped by eons of dance,
returning again to places it ran before people were here,
to chatter,
laugh,
and make soul remedies.

The holy granting of desert fragrance -
Juniper, Pine, and Sage
when receding fog makes a pact with cool dawn breeze
to love you over and over
brushing, licking, adoring.

When gratitude clings,
a sly sticky child,
peeking out from behind you - charming the world,
giggling,
yes,
gratitude beckons, follows and carries.

Singing Coyotes at 3am,
this time mournful,
no celebration,
their chorus of loss on a moonless night.

Things that rested in my hand
that  aren’t mine -
pearlescent beetle,
a tiny pool of rain water,
her wedding ring,
and questions life has left
purposely unanswered.

Boots stand watch beside her bed, with socks and jeans waiting.
She’ll be ready to go before the sun is,
ordinary life being measured in time spent away from Horses,
because when she’s riding,
she leaves time behind.

She may grow up without a Mother,
and without much advice from God,
but she’ll never be without a Horse,
not ever.

Sometimes I catch her smiling
with a far away look.
I know she’s talking to the Horses,
dancing across a mesa,
speaking in the freedom tongue they know.

I think they’re all there when the sun sets,
Horses and the people who share their spirit,
remembering, dreaming, breathing life into each other.

When my daughter rides she travels a litany of hoof prints,
praying for another day,
saying yes, thank you, I understand glory now,
riding so goodness will be born anew in a place that doesn’t make goodness easy.

My prayers sound different, but I pray for the same things.

Every night when she goes to bed her boots are there,
with her socks and jeans waiting.

Grief mends us
with rose-thorned hands
that are sure
and tender
and brutal
and giving.

With a flick of her wrists
she unfurls a blanket
from beneath her skirts
made of the tangled place
between night and nothingness.
She casts it hard to the horizon,
stretching farther than people can see.

Settling together beneath its weight
darkness becomes our home.
It's hard to breath
but we can sob
while our insides turn out
engulfing us.

Grief sways,
humming along with the symphony of decay
made by the tiniest creatures
busily making soil of us all.
We settle deeper into her folds
unraveling completely.

She stitches
against our souls
using strong new sinew
that is wizened
and of the dark.

We feared grief so much
but she made wholeness of us again
with her rose-thorned hands
that are sure,
and loyal.

Grief mended us
while we lay weeping in her lap
believing the world had ended.

This prayer book you’ve given me,
made of dirt damp mornings
and endless sermons on fatherhood
rests so easily in my hands,
I sometimes forget it's here.

When she was still with us I didn’t need to open it,
I just looked over at her,
wife, mother, woman,
watched what she was doing,
learned prayer that way.

This book you’ve given me,
in the shape of a day,
with the voice of canyon winds,
and a binding made of night skies that swallow me whole,
is how I find my way home,
to this moment
where glory - robed in Juniper and Pine,
trotting on thick, padded dog paws,
with the curious, restless eyes of my children,
is always waiting for me.

In these pages I discover my own prayer,
knowing she is with us,
everywhere.

Grieve like a late summer storm that ruins everyone's picnics.

Grieve like dew finally, achingly, tumbling from a wildflower petal,
or an old truck roaring through a long tunnel like it's chasing the devil.

Grieve like an undertow, one that catches you by surprise,
or a lost child in a train station,
ready to go somewhere but not knowing where
or who to go with.

Grieve like a love letter buried in damp dirt,
that you know will dissolve this season,
leaving longing written deep in the darkness.

Grieve like a Mother who has lost one child,
but still cradles another,
knowing she must love with a shattered heart.

Grieve like a precocious dancing newborn horse that can’t be bridled or even made sense of.

Grieve like a bridge crumbling with age and all the weight it’s carried,
everything it’s held and seen,
suddenly given to the abyss below.

Grieve like every bellow from your lungs is a new masterpiece fit for the Sistine Chapel,
that will only fade as you fade.

Grieve as if you held the hands of every child killed in war,
watching the life fade,
their eyes wondering why this has all ended so suddenly,
in such horror.

Grieve as if you’re folding your loss like dough,
over and into itself,
binding it too itself
so that in your heart it can be made into love again.

Grieve as if everything mattered and your life was just one hand passing that devotional on to the next.

My mate has died but parenting did not end.
We all still need to be raised,
my Cygnets and I
learning to make the world our home,
together again.

I love my children the way Swans love theirs,
shepherding them,
preening them,
leading them out into the day as glorious lords and ladies of the marsh.

Circling them I weave attention's nest,
that they may thrive,
explore,
nibble,
sail the smaller eddies of childhood.

A father's love is no less a force than the tides of the world.

They will leave me some day,
I still dip down to fold laundry for my eldest and brush the youngest's hair.

The wetlands will always be filled with them.
I lead them now,
all the while practicing feeling currents without them.

The poetry of Being is scattered throughout time and the cultures of the world. It is written by Sufis, American Transcendentalists, Asian Zen and Taoist masters, a myriad modern poets, as well as many others. The profound experiences they convey can be felt in Celtic legends and Native American prayers. Their authors not only document the wonderment of life but the deeper presence that is evoked by their experiences. They relate an expansive sense of Being awakened through nature, creating a synergy between the inner and the outer that dissolves separation between self and that greater presence.

Though centuries and cultural differences may separate us, their words have not dimmed, they still light the way.

Sitting Alone on Jingting Mountain By Li Po - (701–762)

The birds have vanished down the sky,
Now the last cloud drains away.
We sit together, the mountain and me,
Until only the mountain remains.

From Don’t Go Back to Sleep, by Rumi

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don’t go back to sleep.

You must ask for what you really want.
Don’t go back to sleep.

People are going back and forth
across the doorsill
where the two worlds touch…

From The Song of Amergin - ancient Irish legend

I am a Stag of seven tines,
I am a flood across a plain,
I am a wind on a deep lake,
I am a tear the Sun lets fall,
I am a Hawk above the cliff…

From Meditations by Sarah Margaret Fuller

Today, for the first time, I felt the Deity,
And uttered prayer on hearing thunder. This
Must be thy will, — for finer, higher spirits
Have gone through this same process, — yet I think
There was religion in that strong delight,
Those sounds, those thoughts of power imparted. True,
I did not say, ‘He is the Lord thy God,’
But I had feeling of his essence.

The Beauty Way Prayer from the Diné, a First Nations People

In beauty I walk
With beauty before me I walk
With beauty behind me I walk
With beauty above me I walk
With beauty around me I walk
It has become beauty again
It has become beauty again
It has become beauty again
It has become beauty again

From At the River Clarion, by Mary Oliver

I don’t know who God is exactly.
But I’ll tell you this.
I was sitting in the river named Clarion, on a water splashed stone
and all afternoon I listened to the voices of the river talking.
Whenever the water struck a stone it had something to say,
and the water itself, and even the mosses trailing under the water.
And slowly, very slowly, it became clear to me what they were saying.
Said the river I am part of holiness.
And I too, said the stone. And I too, whispered the moss beneath the water…

Poetry is one of the arts by which we can both experience the presence of Being and guide ourselves deeper into its fullness. I imagine Mary Oliver amplifying the voice of that river as she sat in its company and wrote, her pencil conjuring forth the many voices so audible to her.

I’ve been migrating back into the practice of opening to Being (a word for God/Goddess/Spirit I use as it conveys both a presence in the physical world as well as timeless transcendence), as my focus on grief and family pulls less on my creative process. Developing an awareness of Being through the arts is not only nourishing for those of us invested in it, but essential if our culture is to grow any well rooted wisdom about living with love and gratitude on this beloved planet of ours.

I hope the following poems, arising out of my daily life, encourage you in opening to and receiving the essential presence of Being available to us all.

*For those who want to sit back and listen, I’ve arranged the spoken poems as a video playlist on youtube. Click here to listen.

I’m not to interpret,
but to listen and intuit,
drifting with the oration of the forest,
unwedded and yearning,
unfolding with me inside of it.

I’ve been told again and again by those advisors who can’t be seen,
I must listen, quiet myself.

Listen.

Perhaps I can hear the clouds sailing above, hanging lower, turning grey with the weight of the water they’ll return to all of us who live below,
or the movement of the soil pushed at by inspired, pale roots,
and the toads buried so deep,
still pulsing,
gently.

Every moment there’s a letter to be opened by each of us,
a honeyed serenade gifted to us we must read and release,
making room for the next.
I need to tend to these glorious sermons.

Listen.

I’d write poetry.

We’d have too many pets to count,
eat above our pay grade,
have way too much desert,
be lazy,
rude,
hilarious,

and I’d write poetry,

about the impossibility of our love,
how large it is, how it swallows me before dawn
when I picture both of them sleeping safely
in their beds that hold them like I used to every night,
cherished but still balanced on the edge of life,
waiting to become something new.

I would worry of course,
feel there was no safety net,
wonder when it all comes apart,
and then remind myself that today I will put food in front of them,
tell them through benedictions of laundry, waking up when the alarm was ignored, and driving, driving and more drivings,
how wonderful they are,
to me and the world that is only just discovering them.

I might look for a prayer someone else has written
to encompass the beauty I’m awash in
the gratitude I feel,
but I wouldn’t find one,

so I’d have to write poetry instead.

Dance sometimes looks like an old vine clinging to a stone wall -
staggering in every direction, doubling back on itself,
down or up, it doesn’t matter,
dance is discovery unbound.

I can love that I’m made of broken things, even though it hurts sometimes.
My body is still willing to become a river,
carrying me forward, deeper into Being.

I’m as blessed as the day I was born,
wandering from one pool of light to the next,
never begging for wonderment, always feasting.

Some days they squawked at me for getting too close to a nest,
tiny creature members scuttled away from my clumsy feet,
a few offered me friendship from time to time,
I always said yes.

All animal beings have their own ways.
Horses are so proud and cocky in their majesty,
yet deeply humble when they love.
Each winged being that circles the Earth is a unique citizen
in a flowing axial wave that wraps us all in grace, curiosity, and mirth,
with hilarious Corvid commentators, always watching, laughing, and chiding.

I’ve spent time with Seals, the good people of the Sea.
I believe they carry the most ancient stories of our Oceans,
its many battles and births in their longing eyes.
At times they seem like a brash people, hard and raucous,
but they are sensuous lovers too,
only surpassed by Otters.

It doesn’t matter how deeply I wander into the human world
they always welcome me back as if no time has passed
and we can travel together again.
I bump into humans there from time to time,
then they become kin too.

The hands of the forest reach into his body as we glide,
relaxed, open.
I feel the prayer of moving, being,
held in the sky by magic.

I have to let this wonderment break me apart
so that I might walk through a forest
and feel that I’m walking in prayer,
content to be a small part of now
in the greater Being.

Tomorrow I’ll stand in my circle again
and fly with him through the forest
so that I risk being broken apart,
so I can walk through the world
like it’s a prayer.

We’re so easily trapped by chatter about how we look,
how strong we are, how good a provider we might be,
ignoring the song we all carry inside of us,
the one that calls us home to our bodies,
and everything unfolding around and through us.

We can be as good at love as we are at fighting,
as supple as we are strong,
as vulnerable as we are certain.

But still we wander through the modern world,
chasing shadows of what a man is supposed to be
dolled out by those who have no feeling left within themselves.

If we could just trust this falling,
the moment the ground gives way,
when you don’t know what will happen next,
have the courage to tumble without hope of landing,
then we would know what it is to be truly alive
and the man would follow.

Everything is different about her.

But I know she’ll belong in the world,
because of the way she sits on a horse,
her rightful place,
a true home.

To some it must look like she’s working when she rides,
laser focus,
no missteps,
but I know she’s pumping out joy, carving a holy trail through forests,
over mesas and across beaches,
daring the world to say no to her just once,
so she can drill those mighty hooves in deep,
wiping away every cold look or closed heart
with the kick of her boots and a twitch of the reins.

When we pass a field of grazing horses
she sees a new cousin, a brother or sister,
on four legs,
waiting to meet for the first time,
and maybe ride to the edge of the day,
discover treasures that belong only to them
and those who ride like it’s the first song they ever heard.

Horses are with her when she dreams,
whether she remembers or not,
a herd that beds down in her heart,
ready to gather at dawn.

I know my daughter will belong everywhere horses run
and anywhere she can dream.

We can conjure together sentences that make you feel seen,
known by that important person,
words that are a salve,
words that uplift.

We don’t need to know exactly what they are,
just that they are the sutures to draw together torn parts,
to sing to the mending being that lives inside of you,
wake them, put them to work,
birth that confluence-river of love and safety and warmth and mirth.

We can tie these new words together and bury them outside in soft, damp dirt.

You and I will know they are now part of the soil,
healing things, helping life flourish.
The person you wanted to hear speak them may not be able to deliver them to you,
probably not in the way you wanted,
with a bowed head,
and a true heart.

Still the words are here,
in the world,
waiting for you,
holding you,
abundant and yours.