Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

... Alfred Lord Tennyson (1850)

The Eighth Day

I enter my darkening house with
aching feet and a bulging bag
of groceries which I place on a table
before a window overlooking the Sound
and mountains beyond.
Shoes kicked off, coat on a chair,
my eye is caught by the death throes
of a housefly in the corner of the window,
then rises to see a brilliant orange line,
like neon, emerging from
where the Earth drops off.

The fly is soon quiet, its struggle over
and I am part of a vast silence as,
slowly, before me appears
October's moon at the full
like a ripe, shimmering fruit,
pregnant with the seeds of those twins
Beauty and Mystery.

Still as a stone, my breath deep,
I stand as witness to this spectacle
which fills my room with cool fire
as she moves diagonally
across my window,
getting entangled in the branches
of a fir, but not for long.
As I move toward bed, she continues
her journey through the night,
in one window, out the next,
until her brilliance pales
and she vanishes at sunrise.

Unless---she stays a while,
this 'lesser light,' to remind us
that she will return
and that she will be splendid.
Surely, there must have been
an eighth day
for the creation of such
a wanton jewel.

… by Barbara Wolf (2008)

... research ...

If we knew what we were doing
it wouldn't be called research.

.. by Albert Einsten

... letting go

We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned,
so as to accept the life that is waiting for us.
-- Joseph Campbell

When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.
-- Lao Tzu

Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to move forward.
-- Author Unknown

Owe

Owe no one anything except to love one another for he who loves another has fulfilled the law.

- Romans 13:8
-- (NKJV)

I am one

I am one. I cannot do everything,
---but I can do something.
And because I cannot do everything,
I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.
What I can do, I should do.
And what I should do,
by the grace of God,
I will do.'

-- Edward Everett Hale

Now Thank We All Our God

A Hymn of Thanksgiving

Now thank we all our God,
... With heart and hands and voices,
Who wondrous things has done,
... In Whom this world rejoices;
Who from our mothers' arms
... Has blessed us on our way
With countless gifts of love,
... And still is ours today.

O may this bounteous God
... Through all our life be near us,
With ever joyful hearts
... And blessed peace to cheer us;
And keep us in His grace,
... And guide us when perplexed;
And free us from all ills,
... In this world and the next!

All praise and thanks to God
... The Father now be given;
The Son and Him Who reigns
... With Them in highest Heaven;
The one eternal God,
... Whom earth and Heaven adore;
For thus it was, is now,
... And shall be evermore.

--Martin Rinkart c. 1636
(translation by Catherine Winkworth)

Heinberg summing up

Growth is dead.
Let's make the most of it.
A crisis is a terrible thing to waste.

Burning Down the House

Watch out
You might get what you're after
Cool babies
Strange but not a stranger
I'm an ordinary guy
Burning down the house

Hold tight wait till the party's over
Hold tight we're in for nasty weather
There has got to be a way
Burning down the house

Here's your ticket pack your bag: time for jumpin' overboard
The transportation is here
Close enough but not too far, maybe you know where you are
Fightin fire with fire

All wet
Hey you might need a raincoat
Shakedown
Dreams walking in broad daylight
Three hun-dred six-ty five de-grees
Burning down the house

It was once upon a place sometimes I listen to myself
Gonna come in first place
People on their way to work baby what did you expect
Gonna burst into flame

My house's out of the ordinary
That's right
Don't want to hurt nobody
Some things sure can sweep me off my feet
Burning down the house

No visible means of support and you have not seen nuthin yet
Everything's stuck together
I don't know what you expect staring into the tv set
Fighting fire with fire

- Talking Heads

God in cast-off pieces

Look then at the faces and bodies of people you love.
The explicit beauty that comes not from smoothness of skin or neutrality of expression, but from the web of experience that has left its mark. Each face, each body is its own living fossilized, record. A record of cats, combatants, difficult births; of accidents, cruelties, blessings. Reminders of folly, greed, indiscretion, impatience. A moment of time, of memory, preserved, internalized, and enshrined within and upon the body.
You need not be told that these records are what render your beloved beautiful.
If God exists, He is there, in the small, cast-off pieces, rough and random and not two alike.

from Broken for You by Stephanie Kallos
(from a friend)

Thank you, Lord.

Noble

Terrible or not, difficult or not,
the only thing that is beautiful,
noble, religious and mystical is
to be happy.

- Arnaud Desjardin

Grand

The things that matter most in our lives are not fantastic or grand. They are moments when we touch one another.

- Jack Kornfield

The end of the story?

Where there is disappointment,
I don't know if it's the end of the story.
But it may be just the beginning of a great adventure.

- Prema Chodron

Confidence

Confidence is closely linked to how
well our perceptions match reality.

- Mathieu Ricard26 2008

A New Map

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.

-- T.S. Eliot (1942)

two ways, one way

The human soul is always moving outward
into the external world and inward into itself,
and this movement is double
because the human soul would not
be conscious were it not suspended between contraries.
The greater the contrast,
the more intense the consciousness.

-- William Butler Yeats

Roots by the stream

He will be like a tree planted by the water
that sends out its roots by the stream.
It does not fear when heat comes;
its leaves are always green.
It has no worries in a year of drought and
never fails to bear fruit.

Jeremiah 17:8 (NIV)

Coastal 'Coature'

This blog of adventures may well be worth your investigation ... poetry, photography, and more.

2 Corinthians 4:17-18

While we look not at the things which are seen,
but at the things which are not seen:
for the things which are seen are temporal;
but the things which are not seen are eternal.

(2 Corinthians 4:18)

Thy Will

Thou changest my flesh into fertile soil;
Thou turnest my blood into streams of water;
Thou kneadest my clay,
I know, to make a new universe.

~ Hazrat Inayat Khan

God's living love

You are truly successful when you are
a healthy channel through whom God's
living love can flow like fresh water to thirsty souls.

~ Rev. Dr. Robert Schuller

We can’t change the cards we’re dealt,
just how we play the hand.

- Randy Pausch

We make a living by what we get,
but we make a life by what we give.

by Winston Churchill

ladder's gone

Now that my ladder's gone
I must lie down where all the ladders start
In the foul rag-and-bone shop of the heart.

by W.B. Yeats

a birthday poem

When geometric diagrams and digits
Are no longer the keys to living things,
When people who go about singing or kissing
Know deeper things than the great scholars,
When society is returned once more
To unimprisoned life, and to the universe,
And when light and darkness mate
Once more and make something entirely transparent,
And people see in poems and fairy tales
The true history of the world,
Then our entire twisted nature will turn
And run when a single secret word is spoken.

Novalis (c. 1800)

The Water Way

Up into the canyon, the smell of rain still in the air,
I climb into a mist gray morning.
The stream is full now, gone so long from our lives
we thought we’d dreamed it
and water now overflows the path.
A log appears to balance on
across a flooded stretch and then
the path twists up along the hillside
through trees white with early blossoms.
I watch my step, the stones like ball-bearings
beneath my feet,
the sound of water growing louder as I climb.
I think of water which falls and flows
and doesn’t struggle,
doing what is demanded of it.
Effortlessly, it becomes a fog, a torrent,
a stagnant pool where insects of every wing and tentacle
live out their generations in a blink of time.
Sometimes it seeps to unseen depths
to merge and move in hidden ways toward the sea.
And so a great wheel has turned.
Mine is the animal way, to watch and learn.
To learn from water acceptance and grace,
the uselessness of struggle in the face of change,
the beauty of all stages,
the courage to be someone I hadn’t expected to be,
and to welcome this stranger into my heart.

by Barbara Wolf (1995)

Proverbs 16:7

When a man's ways please the LORD,
he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.
- King James Version

Jason at the Peak

Extreme Guide,

on right with charges,

Jason Champion (2008)

Creamworld

I dream the world was made out of ice-cream.
I dream the people will eat their houses and they drink the ocean.
I dream the paper was made out of chocolate.

... by Alondra Angel, age 10 (2007)

A link to the Seattle Times story by Marian Liu on
Bus Poetry, called "Poetry in motion ... on buses".

Link to Poetry on Buses organization.

I dreamt that a zebra was talking to me
I gave him some food
And walked away

The zebra followed me
I yelled, "GO BACK!"

He didn't want to go back
But he went back
Ate some grass
And then drove off
In a red monster truck

... by Giovanni Paredes, age 6 (2007)

The 2007 Metro project, poetry on buses, come to life with this audio slideshow.

Give up all hope for a better past.

O America

O let America be America again
The land that never has been yet
And yet must be

... - Langston Hughes

friends and brothers

Proverbs 17:17

The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. The way to be happy is to make others so.

- Robert Green Ingersoll

First Grade Friends

A boy named Rusty.
Never seen one like him.
Carrot-top head.
Freckle-dotted cheeks.
I dream of sitting next to him.

Me: A girl named Bharati.
He's never seen one like me.
Mop-top head.
Cinnamon skin.
He looks into my chocolate eyes.
And offers me his lunch.

... by Vijaya Bodach

Charlotte Perkins Gilman

So when the great word "Mother!" rang once more,

I saw at last its meaning and its place;

Not the blind passion of the brooding past,

But Mother -- the World's Mother -- come at last,

To love as she had never loved before --

To feed and guard and teach the human race.

The Traveler

She has put on invisibility.

Dear Lord, I cannot see --

But this I know, although the road ascends

And passes from my sight,

That there will be no night;

That You will take her gently by the hand

And lead her on

Along the road of life that never ends,

And she will find it is not death but dawn.

I do not doubt that you are there as here,

And You will hold her dear.

Dear Lord, I thank You for the faith tat frees,

The love that knows it cannot lose its own;

The love that, looking through the shadows, sees

That You and she and I are ever one!

... by James Dillet Freeman

"He leads me beside still waters; he restores my soul."

- Psalm 23:2-3

Cold In Our Hearts

The cold did not prevent our walk. I carried my camera
and led the way. We went to where the little birds
had been. There had been a flock of Townsend warblers

yesterday. Little birds with yellow markings around
their eyes made small pleasing sounds. You thought they
must have moved further south. I searched other parts of the woods,

settled for taking a picture of an ant hill.
Instead of birds, the little boy from the house
down the road appeared. He wanted to know

when I’d be planting potatoes.
You said you were “”wobbly”.
We went inside and I gave you white cranberry juice.

The afternoon news began and I decided to make cake
the way they make it in Normandy France.
Butter, eggs, flour, chocolate melting in the copper double boiler,

a pinch of salt, a cup of sugar, nothing more,
a little cake for later;
food for the stomach a bird for the soul.

We looked at the Carnegie report. It confirmed
our suspicion that the causus belli for beginning
the War in Iraq last March was false. We agreed

we would not show the report to the girls.
White flags and yellow painted birds
with chocolate cake ought to be enough.

But you became quiet, thought it would be best
not to read anymore of the Carnegie report.

It might keep us awake.
I cleared the table. Only the indigo blue cloth
remains.

... by Diane Wyland Carle (2004)

[Written January 26, 2004 when they "received in the mail a copy of The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, January 2004 Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq, evidence and implications.
- RocksWorks]

I wish

I wish
I could
Talk, squawk, squeak, sing
To animals
And they would understand
Replies
From distant skies would come thunderbirding down
To drown my words in the ocean
The unearthly whale songs
Elephant gongs reverberate
Inside my head
And I know the words

... anonymous, age 17

poetry in song

Pete Seeger: The Power of Song on PBS this week

Word of the Day

catenary

your one wild precious life

"What is it you plan to do in your one wild and precious life?"

-- Mary Oliver

Harry offering

In our youth exploring truth, it seems we always knew
by sight, by touch and smells of such what everyone might do.

But now, we’re all refashioned and all
so up to date; we live and lurch and thrash
about from distances so great.

We need telephones and postals,
the arts and sciences too, just to help us keep our place
in space, though we might prefer a zoo

with the joys of somewhat shorter lives in necessary toil
when spent together could be better than extended gropes in modern fetter.

And yet since we ourselves have not died young perhaps these days can still be fun.

... by Harry Lloyd Carle (198_)

Night Love

The night pretends
... to give us to each other
and we embrace night

each thinking we hold our lover.

But it is night we love
... because it seals the day
as one mouth seals another.


by Jenifer Browne Lawrence (2007)

Harry offering

Do you realize that the Ginko tree was here
and was probably
food for the dinosaurs?

by Harry Carle (2006)

love alters

This quote, and fragment from a longer poem by Diane Wyland Carle.

“Loves not love which alters when it alteration finds.”

Shakespeare wrote a sonnet with this phrase. This past year Harry and I had a vacation in Long Beach, California where we visited (daughter) Kristen. There I heard doves cooing and it took me back fifty years. I worked on a poem and placed Shakespeare’s words as the epigraph.

...Fifty years of dove life. Wings
lifted. Carried in bird bodies. Soared
point to point,
twig to moth.

It was good to sit on the sand with Harry. We had the sandwiches I made and he befriended one of the shore birds that he noticed had difficulty walking. We walked on the wooden pier at Seal Beach where I’d walked in the past and I took a picture of our shadows moving along before us on the boards of the pier.
Now, in winter, we watch the colors of the days, notice sounds. Wind and water changing landscapes.
In the evening, I practice old piano pieces and Harry seems calm. He turns the pages of books he’s collected.

“Love, light and courage will come from God.”
…

the unaltered love.

... -- from Diane Wyland Carle (2005)

Mourning Doves

... "Love is not love

... which alters when it alteration finds ..." William Shakespeare

All these years later,

murmuring distant warbling throat noises.

Sounds of Long Beach.

I first heard doves near a willow tree.

... "Which room did you have?"

... "Room. We didn't have a room.

... We were children. I was seventeen.

... I rode down on the Cherry Street bus.

... He came from his Navy ship.

... We met at the beach behind the hotel."

Fifty years of dove life. Wings

lifted. Carried in bird bodies. Soared

point to point

twig to moth.

Now, palm trees trimmed. Shoreline altered.

A road runs through the beach.

Off-shore oil island disguiesed with colored lights.

Cooing mourning doves.

Unaltered love waits beneath the roof.

... by Diane Wyland Carle (2005)

Mourning Dove poem is dedicated to Gary Lee Gambs who turned 70 on February 17, 2006.

Five Questions

She wears the mountain path to granite.

Esses of red-shouldered hawks in the sky,
switchback carved into rock.

No more than a dusting --
field turned white, creek lazy and dark.

Poetry

... High Theater

a glowing windy night
full of moonlight
on water

now covered by clouds,
small, billowy things
here and there

casting mauves,
many silvery grays,
schools of golden fish

darting briefly into and out
of existence
but always and more

until their scene ends.
winds change everything
and now the clouds leave

only the alders
against the sky and moon,
great slanting poles

with their leaves gone
as seen from backstage

... by Barbara Wolf (2005)

Love, grief, and faith

[Mary Leslie notes: I wrote this a couple of days after learning of my roommate's death in Maui, on her honeymoon. On the day that I was expecting her to return to Seattle with her new husband, I received a call that she had fallen over a waterfall & had been killed. Nothing has shocked me more in my life. - April, 2008]

My back hurts, I'm so tired.
Lord, the pain is deep…
Deeper than I've felt before.
I grieve for my red-haired sister
More of a sister than my own flesh and blood

But why do I grieve and hurt so deeply?
I know that my dear sister is face
to face with Jesus in Heaven.
I could never want anything more for her.

But the shock of her sudden death is all too much.
I don't want it to be true - I'm selfish Lord.
I had already made many plans for her and I.

Her bed, vanity, mugs, and food are still in my home.
Why did she leave her make-up and recipes?
A wedding gift from her Grandma has been delivered, as if
she will open it soon.

Why Lord? There were so many more times to spend together,
prayers to pray, and feelings to share.

Shine my Lord,
into this shattered heart.
Only your love can heal me.
Your peace can soothe my weary mind.

Strengthen my faith, give me new hope.
Fill my life with your love.

God saw that her purpose had been perfectly completed.
Her love, life, laughter, and work for the Lord was finished.

I must take what she has given me and serve the Lord with it.

Shine my Lord…. Shine through me.

... by Mary Leslie (1995)

The Last Apple

Walking in the garden
this spring day
I see one surviving apple
still clinging to the tree
on a fragile branch.
Wizened and brown,
like a shrunken head,
it has weathered winter winds,
storms and snow
and yet remains
to greet the new buds
that are bursting out
everywhere.
Like a great, great grandparent,
always expected to die,
but still there at the table
for Thanksgiving yet again,
hanging in for the turkey
and dressing and
don't forget
the cranberry sauce.

... by Barbara Wolf (2008)

Turning a Corner

moving slowly
sensing where she is
all is familiar

old, old dog,
low to the ground,
mark of the breed

blind these last five years
now out the gate
left open by mistake

into the night
all the same to her
and down the street

hugging the curbing,
secure in its sturdy shoulder,
down the long block

until it ends
as things do

what more to say
when it's over
and nothing beyond

how to go on
and to what,
nothing's the same

or as good as it was
but the heart still beats
life wants itself

a corner is turned,
must be followed
it leads to more

of what it is
solid ambiguity
aiming at another corner.

... by Barbara Wolf (1995)

Resources

I have resources in leaf and wind,
in the cascading cry of hawks,
who glide wide circles in a clouded sky.
Even the slanting light on my horse’s ear
as he crops swept grasses, moves me,
perfectly, to a different place.

A place where, eventually,
the static in my head does cease.
Where the answer to this dilemma,
not sought only for this brief peace,
sends a shoot down to root
somewhere fertile.

Oh, the storm, especially!
festering and exaggerated,
careening as if down some hollow alley, before
imploding and then receding
from the dripping, torn world,
brings relief, and a perspective.

Informed, not by concern or worry,
not by weighing under furrowed brow,
the pros and cons, the
shoulds and don’ts,
the right or wrong…

But by the weight of any one or more
of these— offerings:
carried in my belly like a nourishing meal,
drawn in like a breath,
transforming and ineffable.

The sun ahead in the parting trees,
on woods paths followed as a child…The nap,
until-wakened-by-crows, under pines…Or
the caught-frog’s eye:
blinking, reflecting my own face
before pasture and sky.

Beloved-familiar, so enchanting!
I pray that my sons tap your resources,
sacred nearby, hopefully hidden in blood.
I pray that, though city-born and inundated,
they know the way to go to find these
ripe and vibrating gifts!

... by Barrie Smeeth (2008)

These Days Of Early Spring

These are the days
you linger outside
in the late-sun’s rays,
hearing the breeze increase in new leaves,
knowing its direction
by the way your horse’s tail
ruffles and arcs
against one hock. Or,
if it’s windy enough, how
it scoops between back legs
up under his belly,
while he casts a long shadow
and grabs mouthfuls of fattening grass.

These are the days
of few bugs yet, though
they’re coming, and growing things—
burgeoning green—buzz anyway,
too rich to contain their glee.
At night you apply lotion
to dry, sun-colored skin
and feel gritty bits of dust mixed in.
You’re hot until
the sun goes down
and the wind picks up, when
you suddenly need a jacket
to wrap these days in close to your skin.

... by Barrie Smeeth (2007)

Watercolor by Barrie Smeeth (2007)

Just Spice

Looking back on my life,
can I write about the past objectively?
It’s oddly attached to me.
When I think about it,
or begin to feel about it,
it weighs
the value
of my choices…

Like something on wheels
that I pull behind at the airport
and check through security,
and drag in and out of the overhead bins,
it complicates my trip to the coast.
I’d rather have it be just spice,
put in early,
unidentified in today’s meal.

Not seasoning that defines.
Not taken so seriously.
“Chicken Oregano”, “Sweet Basil Pasta”:
so pivotal to ordering.
Can’t one be happy
just showing up at dinner,
expectant but not weighing?
As kids we were, weren’t we?

So what if I’m a “mother”,
used, all these years, to mixing spices,
choosing nutritional value
and creating meals?
I’ll find back the habit
of just leaving my sandy suit
on the floor where I stepped out of it,
and showing up for the evening meal!


... by Barrie Smeeth (2008)

Truth Force

"Man and his deed are two distinct things. It is quite proper to resist and attack a system, but to resist and attack its author is tantamount to resisting and attacking oneself. For we are all tarred with the same brush, and are children of one and the same Creator, and as such the divine powers within us are infinite. To slight a single human being is to slight those divine powers, and thus to harm not only that being but with him the whole world."

- Mahatma Gandhi

Bailey

She was six months old
Floppy ears, bouncing & bounding
I looked at her with immense joy
How could she have changed my life?
. but she has…

Not a moment's peace, but that's o.k.
Her happy wagging tail greets me after
. each long day at work
She follows me from room to room,
adoringly watching my every move

She swims at the park & chases the ducks

One would think she would tire after an hour,
but not Bailey. Why rest, there is too much living
. to do today.

Bailey is a brilliant pup, and learns ever so quickly
Stubborn she is, I think stubborn goes with brilliant
She argues at times, throwing her head back & forth
So much like a child

When it's time to eat, she woofs at me & tosses her head
. towards the kitchen

As I meditate, she lays quietly at my feet.
If I'm sad, she's willing & ready to lend an ear,
and snuggle up beside me, one paw always on me.

But, I'm in trouble….
she's only six months old, and I'm smitten.
I never expected to fall so deeply in love with an animal.
The connection we have is incredible.
Our hearts are in sync.

I know there will be a time when I will lose her
I can't stand the thought
I don't want to ever lose her, she's my baby
She's my family.

Now it's 16 years later, Bailey has been gone a year
My heart is still broken…. In pieces
Her ashes, and collar sit on a table
The vet had cut of some of her fur & put it in a bag for me
I still can't touch it
I miss her so much

I still can't stand the thought of losing her.

. by Mary Leslie (2008)

Keep the channel open

There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and be lost. The world will not have it.

It is not your business to determine how good it is, nor how valuable it is, nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly; to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep open and aware directly to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open.

- Martha Graham to Agnes DeMille

Breathe

You hear a garbled voice
giving directions you don’t understand.
You wait.
Then something begins to move you along.
There is now nothing you can do.
You have no control.
A panic rises.
Breathe.

You’re being swept along
a wet path, like a rising river,
and then giants appear
tossing their huge heads
of thick red hair all around,
slapping and flapping,
swirling as in a frenzy,
dancing until they drop as though dead.

Then more water sprays,
with a rocking force,
pummeling, slamming
on all sides of you, a raging surge
and then it stops.
Now you’re going backwards.
Your progress is reversing
while a gentle solution washes
all around, sliding down in droplets
as you start once again
toward the original direction
where you see a red light
turn green and there is silence.

Breathe.

Turn on the car.
Drive out. It’s over.
Someone you’ve never seen
is waiting with a towel.
You head out to the highway,
cars barreling down from both
directions. You wait to get safely onto the road,
an achievement a minute as you drive
toward home, knowing
that the end is still to come.

And you still have really no control

Breathe

by Barbara Wolf (2008)

Ill Never Stop Dancing Inside

I'll never forget the memories
... of childhood
The person I was then will
... always be me
I now appear wiser with
... years of experience
I'll look like I've changed but
... you can't see

I'll never stop dreaming or
... loving or laughing
Although old man time can't
... be denied
I'll never stop wanting to be
... all I can be
And I'll never stop dancing
... inside

Yeh, I'm still dancing on the
... inside
I'm dancing all the time
Life is too short to ever stop
... dancing
Deep down I'm dancing
... inside

I'll never stop dancing inside
No, I'll never stop being the
... person I have been
Every mirror I've seen has
... always lied
Life is too short whatever
... your age
To ever stop dancing inside
So I'll never stop dancing inside.

...

by Kenny Walther

[From Metro (Seattle) bus bench.
-RocksWorks]

He who converses ...

Those who talk do not know.

Those who do not know talk.

... - Lao Tzu

Rock 'n' Roll Lyfestile

Your excess ain't Rebellion,
You're drinking what they're selling."
- From '(How do you afford your) Rock 'n' Roll Lifestyle', by Cake

"Joy isn't a thing. It's in every one of us."
- Wagner

"When you have come to the edge
Of all the light that you know
And are about to step out
Into the darkness of the unknown,
Faith is knowing that one of two things will happen:
There will be something solid on which to stand,
Or you will be taught to fly."

anonymous

Soul Winner

In the deep of night,
Souls weeping for light,
If the world can’t give,
Who can afford to give?
Oh, what a spark!
A light in the dark,
Kneeling down with tears,
Evil forces trembling with fears.
Speak the Word,
For Faith overcomes the world.
Carry the light,
And lead sinners to the true Light.
Keep on shining through the night,
The Lord may come at twilight.

By Jose B. Cabajar © 2003

Other Words, Other People ...

First Day of March, and here are a few stories that reflect the power of kind, compassionate words - and sometimes less words, but good listening skills:

This one from the Faith & Values column, by Rabbi Mark S. Glickman, focuses on the value of perspective - we all need it at one time or another. This can be powerful.

The title of the Seattle Times staff reporter, Jennifer Sullivan's article, is
Police talk barefoot woman off ledge, partly by not talking.

So, what's your perspective - on words, or other expessions? We are always creating our own reality; are we partnering with a greater good to make the most of it?

Secrets

After Daddy died, Mama seemed lost and
the house was filled with whispers.
She and Grandma used to sit close together
at the kitchen table, holding hands
and talking in hushed tones.
They had many secrets but would stop talking
when they noticed me standing in the doorway.
That’s how I learned a lot of things
I wasn’t supposed to know,
like how he died.

As husbands came and went,
we moved around from state to state.
I was always the new girl in school
so I learned how to make friends fast
and how to say goodbye,
although there was often no time for that,
just time to grab our things, run for the train,
get our seats and watch out the window
as the towns and countryside
flashed past, including cows.

At night, my little brother and I slept in a bunk
up above our seats.
The Pullman Porter would fix us up
and we’d pretend to go to sleep
but as soon as everyone was quiet,
we’d sneak down and run up and down the aisles
until Mama put a stop to that.

It wasn’t until I was eighteen
that one of those secrets between Mama and
my Grandma popped right up in my head
to change forever who I thought I was.
And I’d known it all the time.

Barbara Wolf (2006)

['Secrets', according to Barbara Wolf, "tells the tory of how the death of a father is experienced by his daughter immediately after the event and as it plays out many years later. I have left it to the reader to determine what the secrets might have been." The above poem has been paired by the poet with our first introduction to her, 'The Ritual', which has also been called, "As a Child".
-RocksWorks]

Nomads

Nomads are not collectors of rocks.
The family of Hassan found themselves
in a desert where red rocks
turn orange and violet in the sunset,
their shadows rising from the sand
purple and indigo up their craggy sides
as the sun drops like a stone behind a mountain.

Hassan’s eyes cut right and left
at the splendor everywhere
beyond his prayer rug.
This beauty brought his mind to
the vibrancy of the hues and the arabesques
of the very rug beneath him and,
though the family moved on,
he knew he would always have
the loveliness of this evening
in his life.
He could roll it up, unfurl it and
contemplate eternity upon it.
Nomads are collectors of rugs.

Barbara Wolf (2006)

[These two poems represent contrasting ways of appreciating the beauty of nature and natural objects. The speaker of each poem, very different from one another. Nevertheless share an aesthetic sense whi can be found in some degree in all people.
-RocksWorks]


To be a collector of stones
is to furnish a space with silence.
To hold them in the hand,
smooth and flat or rough,
almost round, a beneficence.
And yet, it is through eons
of the violence of fire and ice
and planetary upheavals
that they come to their present peace,
to rest here for awhile on a window sill
in sunlight and moonlight
and night’s long darkness,
to quiet the soul.

Stones are as varied as music
from the lumbering bass drum
to the staccato of the piccolo.
Sprinkled with water,
their colors sing.
To move them from place to place,
to build a cairn
where balance is all,
is a meditation.

Barbara Wolf (2006)

the soft song of truth that sets me free,

Naked, Barely

That beauty cannot hide behind rocks,
or fearing the sun lay low beneath the surface of the waves
- dancing only with the moon shadowed caves.
the eyes are ever open in this existence, if i choose the form - of - knowing persistence.
the ever changing glowing chant of distant bells, which lead me away from the clutches of my own created hells--
the internal screaming of my devious Mind, that plays his little tricks as if he´s kind.
He does not turn away from the projected make believe, for me Mind will continue to deceive
as many times as I allow- analysing and rewinding keeping away the present now.
He knows not of the secrets of the heart, the whispers of the soul are just the start:
the beginning of a story to perpetuate fear, the fear that I feel is always, ever near .
that's why I do not tell Mind to go away and find another person to go and play
I enjoy the sensations, the erection of lust, the being right - even as it forces blindness like a moonless night.
to believe my fears as if they know whats true, proving that we are human un-divine through and though.
The black masked angel never is the one who knows, the heshe´s two faces undecided when the whistle train blows.
I watch to see who gets on board with Mind to play,
watch the ones who have learned to keep away --
For when i get it and it is clear,
Mind situates himself gently near.
Allowing for the love song to kiss my knees,
as I listen to Heart´s greatest
... self-fulfilling
... ... ... ... ... needs.
I am the undetectable breath when I allow life to be,
the singing of the chicken in their low hanging tree--
the soft song of truth that sets me free,
whilst enjoying the reality of loving humanity.
Open the Heart and let her be heard,
the balance of my existence with that of the bird
the balance of the sweet with the sour, helps me to be real in every hour.
..I ask to let the world know why,
..why with every tear, its happiness I cry.
..the perfection of the ocean reflected through,
..to the one we ..... ... always
... ... ...... ... ... knew.

The imperfect, wondrous YOU.

gEnevieVe celestE
(2007)

Barbara at the BPA

a love poem

high theater

a glowing windy night
full of moonlight
on water

now covered by clouds,
small scattered things
here and there

casting mauves,
many silvery grays,
a backdrop for

schools of golden fish
made of light
darting in and out

of existence
but always more
filling the stage

until their scene ends.
winds change everything
vanishing the clouds

only the alders remain
great slanting leafless poles
against the sky and moon.

and now act three begins
as seen from my windows,
backstage.

by Barbara Wolf (2003)

A pair of poems ...

When I Am Old

When I am old and cannot dance,
bring me my drum that I might
tap a beat.
Carry me to beneath a tree,
woods all around and
listen with me
to Earth’s soft sounds,
dog at my feet
and quiet mushrooms witnessing.
Here we’ll call death to our laps
and soothe all fears,
letting what must,
throb its last.

Barbara Wolf (2006)


It's Some Job

It’s some job
to prepare for death.
All the papers to sign,
last words to write.
All the feelings of years
to be legally codified
so that the family will
waltz right through
the many first calls:
the picking-up of the body
by the mortuary guy,
Social Security, the bank,
friends and family to notify,
the care of the precious dog.
Then there’s the tossing of the ashes
on the water—or perhaps they’d prefer
a ceremony in the garden
beneath a tree.
Someone could bring a guitar.
After all the food is eaten,
the kitchen cleaned
and everyone has gathered pans and coats and left
the house will be quiet.
There will be no one
sitting at the window
gazing at the bare maple tree
against the changing evening sky,
or watching the busy crows.
Silence will take up residence
throughout the darkening house
and there will be no one
to hear the mouse.

Barbara Wolf (2006)

Hammering

It starts early these dark mornings,
long before the sun is a gray smudge
behind the clouds and fog.
Hammering.
It goes on all day,
except for a lunch break
and then until well after dark.
That’s when he lights a lamp,
his shadows large on the inside walls.
I watch him from my windows,
the young builder of a large house,
unrolling the black paper on the roof,
tacking a billowing blue tarp
across the high peak,
storms on the way.
He works alone,
a solo ballet,
conscious of every step,
what tool to reach for.
Sometimes he waves.

Barbara Wolf (2006)


Hammering - Part II

Those late nights–
he should be home
having dinner with his wife
or soaking in a hot tub
to soothe his aching body.
But there he is on the roof,
a rope tied around the brick chimney,
the other end around his thigh.
I tip my wine glass to him,
he bows with a flourish.
He loses his footing,
He’s falling down the rough shakes.
He grasps at air, the blue tarp,
but it tears like so much gauze.
He’s falling over the side,
dangling by one leg.
I hear sirens.
There are firemen and a ladder.
One grabs him in his arms.
I sigh and turn over
and see the clock.
It’s 6am.
And then I hear it.
Hammering.

Barbara Wolf (2006)

Hammering

Barbara Wolf, 2006

some question

they are born
at first they are nurtured, cherished even
then they grow up
and are told that they are needed
to keep the foe at bay
the mothers are proud, if sad
but some are bitter
they have questions
does war provide the only
means to be heroes?
do we think that if blood is not spilled
on the ground
the sun will not rise?

and what of all the maimed and crippled
those who survive
legless
crumpled in their wheel chairs
forgotten
to live out their lives
long after the war is over
the next war on its way?
did they lust to be heroes?
or were they merely the unlucky
the ones whose numbers came up
the sons and daughters of the poor
to whom promises were made
or were the children of zealots
eager to see them
fight for their country
to make their parents proud?

or is war our disease?
in our blood
chronic
incurable

by Barbara Wolf (2006)

Haiku

across my blankets
shadows of maple branches
wind and moon conspire

through darkened cedars
bright golden path on water
leading to the moon

a wild roar rises
through moonless woods this night
newscasts warn of storms

I break up the moon
with a tossed pebble
soon it's whole again

caught by flashlight's moon
a spider on the blanket
I make the first move

how to make new moons
fill several water bowls
the children's delight

a garden party
so many moons are shining
in our martinis


by Barbara Wolf (2000)

Dream Family

They’re all gone now,
all the aunts and uncles
who bored me so at family dinners:
Uncle Armand who chewed so loud
and told bad jokes,
Aunt Millie with hair like a burning bush
and whose lipstick ran when she ate.
Now my mother,
the beauty,
has joined them,
she of the many husbands
and lovers,
one of whom was the father
I barely knew;
and my Grandma Sarah,
breasts like feather pillows
I used to cuddle up to
on sleepovers,
gone long before.
Now I have all their pictures,
some in frames,
others just leaning against the wall
on my bedside table.
They visit me in dreams.

By Barbara Wolf (2003)

[Published in 2003 by the Bainbridge Island Arts & Humanities Council, this was posted in the windows of town businesses.
- RocksWorks]

Bus Poetry

what I've learned from water
is to welcome change,
flow when I can,
become snow when I must,
then perhaps a mist,
hovering over the earth,
or a fog, snarling traffic,
even an ice cube
tinkling
in your drink.

by Barbara Wolf (2004)

- adapted from "The Water Way"
for 'Poetry on the Busses'
King County Metro, 2005.

The French Bath

She is not easily convinced
that a bath is a good idea,
afraid that she'll slip and fall.
I tell her that I'll hold on tightly,
get her in and out of the tub
and no broken bones.
Even more unsure, she walks with me to the bathroom.
I turn on the water, testing it with my wrist,
while she sits on a chair and watches,
wrapped in a towel, forcing a smile.
She's game to try just to please me,
but her eyes search the walls, the ceiling.

I say, "Honey, the water is ready.
I'll hold you under the arms
you just stand up by the tub.
"Slowly, she rises from the chair.
I slip one arm around her waist,
hold her hand and move her closer.

"Now, lift your leg, Mommy,
That's right, and in it goes.
Doesn't it feel good?
"the eyes wide, the look is skeptical,
but both legs are now in the water.
As I hold her, she gingerly
sits in the tub, surprised that it doesn't hurt.

At ninety-six, bathing had become a sometime thing
and then ended along with showers.
Her husband was too frail to help her and
she didn't want him to see her
so wrinkled and fearful so she lied about her baths.
She managed with a wash cloth and a little soap,
a "French Bath," she called it and no danger of falling.

I run a bit more hot water into the tub,
wash her back and shoulders.
"Here's the wash cloth, Mommy," I say,
"You wash under your arms and don't forget
" Down There." We both laugh.

II

Soon it's over and I begin to let the water out.
This is a crucial time and
her anxiety rises.
"Just let me put this towel
around your shoulders," I say.
"I'll wrap it all around you
and hold you like before."
Slowly, I lift her up,
so light in my arms,
one leg straightening, then the other.
She is standing, reaching out for the wall,
something to hold on to.

I am also afraid.
I hold her carefully as she raises one leg
and I guide it outside the tub.
Before we know it
she is standing on a mat beside the tub,
a large fresh towel and my arms around her.
We laugh.

"There, wasn't that lovely? Don't you feel better?"
"Hmmmmm," she says, "Thank you, dear,"
Still questioning the wisdom
of such a perilous endeavor.
"Well, I feel better," I say.
Although I know that after I leave,
It'll be back to the "French Bath."

Barbara Wolf (2007)

['The French Bath' above was written after the death in 2002 of Barbara's mother.
'The Waitress' was written in 2006, after a car trip to be with her dying step-father, John, "my mother's fifth - and best - husband". It exhibited at the Bainbridge Performing Arts 37 year poetry celebration in 2007.
- RocksWorks]

The Waitress

The meal was good and cheap,
deep fried but tasty.
The waitress, forty or so,
had scraggly bangs
she kept sweeping back from her forehead
and a tired sweetness about her.
I wondered how she could
rise out of her life,whatever it was,
to be so gentle as she
administered to all our hungers
and patient.
Is it fantastic school of waiting,
teaching the fine art of recognizing
that everybody hurts
and we all need butter and sour cream
on our baked potatoto smooth out the rough edges
and pickle relish on the side
to sweeten the day’s sorrows?

Most of the diners are gruff truckersw
ith huge bellies their grimy T-shirts
barely conceal.
One brings flowers,
golden day-lilies from his garden.
She puts them into a large mayonnaise jar
on the counter.
There they sit in this smoky eatery
like brass trumpets rising from a fog.

Outside the truck-stop
a breeze has kicked up
stirring the two trees
that grow among the big rigs.
Their leaves flash silver
in the late-day sun.
Birds with red under their wings
dive bomb for my crumbs.
Inside the restaurant window,
she smiles,
rearranging her flowers.

Barbara Wolf (2006)

Heather's poem

The snowy face of the moon gleans hot breath
in the frigid deserts of the sky.
And I was as lonely as one of these steam trails
coiling upwards in chilly, expansive darkness for
infinitely expanding hours.
Loneliness is an old friend and comes
to the back door
sits down with me under the stoops of twilight.

by Heather Wolf (2007)

Perhaps ... Life

Perhaps, after all, life is more powerful than death.
It keeps happening no matter the multitudes
eternally obliterated in wars and other savage ignorances
or by diseases which feed upon us
like guests at a banquet,
yet, there it is again, right in my garden,
those gladiators, roses and slugs,
fighting and dying and always more.
In an alley in Benares, a baby tossed in the trash,
found by a beggar, the beginning of a long lineage.
Kittens in a bag in the river, but one survives
with a crook in its tail to be passed on and on.
Ah, the forms life takes—and then there are ourselves
who contemplate all this and know our part in it,
to bear the agony of loving the dying,
to witness the pain life everywhere endures,
yet, laughing with friends, being silly or crying
and holding one another
or being silent together
or alone.

by Barbara Wolf

The Speed of Dark

we may never accelerate ourselves
to the speed of light,
but the speed of dark
moves surely within us,
all that darkness of soul
which goes with knowing
we will die---
that love will die with us,
if not before,
after one of our many marriages,
perhaps, implodes
or a beloved leaves---
haunts our days,
inhabits our dreams.

Optimism is the miracle
in the face of this sure knowledge
and laughter,
rising out of us
like multi-colored balloons,
soaring above our
soon-to-be corpse,
the gift we didn't expect,
the surprise we didn't know we wanted.
like going to a garage sale
and finding a treasure
we hadn't imagined,
like the leap of the heart
and the fire in the groin
in the presence of someone
we hadn't expected to feel that way for,
like the sudden fork in the road
we hadn't known would appear
as we traveled our path
and the joy of following it
blindly to its end
and even beyond.
and so we dress up,
we brush our teeth
and move into
the light of day.


- Barbara Wolf (2006)

Mother and Daughter

[In an e-mail exchange, the poet shared the below poem with her daughter. - RocksWorks]

I’ve lost myself

somewhere in the airport
Ladies Room.
Many faces fill the wide mirror
but mine is not there.
I wash my hands and see
an old woman, once blonde,
squinting into my eyes.
She seems to be searching
for someone.
She leans in closer.
A weak smile tries to happen
on her face,
but it appears to disappoint her.
She turns from the mirror,
walks out the door.
Her flight is almost ready.

By Barbara Wolf (2006)

[Her daughter's return message on the morning of Monday, April 3, 2006 read, "That is the SADDEST poem. I hurt for you reading it mom. But I suppose it is true. But mom, here's my response." - RocksWorks]

Daughter's Response

You lost yourself
In the mirror
Somewhere inside the years
before you wrote the poem
When I watched you
Blond, slender, beautiful
Putting on your makeup
The mask in front of your mask
The one you reluctantly wore
To the dinner engagements
The company dinners
That took you hours to prepare for
Hours that when added up
Took years.
I remember your hair
Washed, ratted, flattened, curled, twisted, pinned, sprayed
Never right
You’d throw something down in pain
Saying, “I’m not going, Joe.”
“I just can’t go”
Always worried that you’d be judged.
Who was the judge then, my mama?
The one who decided your value?
Was it the Spanish Inquisitor?
The bank employee?
The young eyes around you in the classroom?
No, they all saw you, my mother, who I loved
And still love, exactly as you were
Exactly as you are
Long gray haired, soft skin, passion in your eyes
For the world of books and cultures and children
Throw away the mirrors, mom. When you die
I highly doubt that your last words will be, “I wish I’d looked better.”

by Linda Wolf (2006)
Learn more about Linda Wolf.

For Genevieve

She is open and vibrant---
she gets sad and lonely.
The view from her window
is the world, its beauty
and its pain.
She knows the suffering,
balances it in her mind
with the emerald spring,
the glory of life's love,
but it is not easy. She goes
within to find the heart to
wake up each day anew,
expecting joy, knowing that
she will be needed
to keep the balance,
to lessen the sadness
where she can.
Her smile and laughter
are the gifts she brings.
Her compassion eases
what others go through.
Her heart beats for life
in herself and she radiates life
to all who come her way.

by Barbara Wolf (2008)

The Lion's Tooth

Here on a low seat, tool in hand
I sit beneath a cedar’s shade
surrounded by a sea of grass
covered by a carpet of yellow.
Dandelions everywhere.
My work is hopeless,
yet I stab the grass and twist
at a root, only to bag half a catch
the rest still in the ground to
rise again.

Angry words of the night before
have left me spent and speechless.
Weeds of the soul, deep rooted
refuse to die. They can’t be forgotten,
erased-- and forgiveness comes hard.

Yet how peaceful here in the shade
to hear the morning sounds,
bird calls, a boat on the water
And to feel purposeful
in this garden job.
Remembering what was said,
digging at it
then letting it go,
beginning to understand
that there will always be weeds.

Barbara Wolf (2007)

Garden Meditation

I sit in my garden this mild September morning,
a gentle sun warming my cheek,
a slight breeze stirring the leaves
of the avocado tree above my head
and I am calm as a stone.
I sink into the sights and sounds of this beauty.
Nearby, a bird shrills; a passing plane adds its basso note,
growing fainter as it leaves the scene.
All the plants and trees of the garden,
orchestrated by a fresh gust of wind,
take up the chorus.
The slanted sunlight dances with its shadows
on every flower and leaf.

And as I write, everything is changing.
It’s warmer now. The air is different, dryer.
The light and shadow dance has moved
further into the garden.
Smells I was unaware of before rise
from the damp bricks beneath my feet.
A winged creature, a species unknown to me,
lights on my page,
its transparent wings trembling.

There is no need to hold on to any bit of it.
Its reality is that it is passing, as I am.
But today it did not pass unnoticed.

Poem & Photo by Barbara Wolf (2007)

The Dusty Soul

Just when I think I’ve got it all,
There’s more —
drifting under the bed,
caught on chair legs,
observed in sunlight
coming through a window.
It’s like the things I do that I regret,
but catch myself doing over and over again.
It’s never finished.
I hold myself to a fair standard
of housekeeping
and mindfulness of what I say and do
but I still have a dusty soul.
There’s always a wispy bit
clinging somewhere,
like the way I hold back warmth,
ignore the help that’s needed,
become defensive,
over-react to something said.
But I am grateful that
I have eyes to see and, sometimes,
enough courage to get out the vacuum
again and again.

by Barbara Wolf

The Poets and The Apple Tree

We bring plates of food and wine
and our poems and plant ourselves
around her garden on creaky chairs or on the grass,
rows of vegetables growing nearby,
writing their own poetry on the evening air.
While the dog makes friends with some children,
running after them, tugging at a sock,
we are in thrall to the apple tree blooming above us,
its gnarled branches venerable evidence
of its struggle to prevail
as, one by one, the poets speak their words
or read those of others,
moving us with what we all go through,
the losses, the joys, the yearnings
and most of all, the too ripe pain,
the unnameable that falls outside the poems,
like the apples on the ground,
the ones that never make it into pies.


by Barbara Wolf (2007)

Love search ...

I've tried the internet
and found a few
but when we meet
and talk of love,
the rubber hits the road
and leaves my heart behind

by Barbara Wolf (2004)

As a child

The Ritual

As a child,
I don’t remember ever seeing
my mother kiss a man.
Long after having become a mother myself
I saw her kiss her fifth husband, John,
and then only on the cheek
after he brought her
a bourbon and water, no ice,
their usual pre-dinner drink,
when she was in a hospital bed.
The nurse said, "Why not?"
John took a flask from his pocket,
poured a shot for her and one for himself,
put a dash of water in each
and handed one to her.
Mom reached up and pulled him close
by his jacket collar and kissed him.
The drink remained on a table by her bed all afternoon
while John held her hand.
The slanting rays of the sun through the blinds,
turned the glass a glowing transparent amber,
Through which,
from where I lay at the foot of her bed,
I could see the clock.

by Barbara Wolf
(c) 2007

Introducing Barbara Wolf, poet & artist

[We begin with a poem that also has been titled "As a Child", -RocksWorks]

The Ritual

As a child,
I don’t remember ever seeing
my mother kiss a man.
Long after having become a mother myself
I saw her kiss her fifth husband, John,
and then only on the cheek
after he brought her
a bourbon and water, no ice,
their usual pre-dinner drink,
when she was in a hospital bed.
The nurse said, "Why not?"
John took a flask from his pocket,
poured a shot for her and one for himself,
put a dash of water in each
and handed one to her.
Mom reached up and pulled him close
by his jacket collar and kissed him.
The drink remained on a table by her bed all afternoon
while John held her hand.
The slanting rays of the sun through the blinds,
turned the glass a glowing transparent amber,
Through which,
from where I lay at the foot of her bed,
I could see the clock.

by Barbara Wolf
(c) 2007