is gone. Leaves turn from green
to gold, the reddest scarlet, and mauve.
They dance their final fiery
love song before the fall.
My heart, this year preoccupied
by illness and death, almost didn’t notice
all the beauty.
Yet on a pensive walk
it received a tugging jolt.
My eyes, who could not resist,
as Imminent curiosity is
their game
beckon the compassionate
one to attention.
Mother is there at the beginning
Mother is who you came out of
Mother is food
Mother is sleep
Mother is love
Mother is the first teacher
Mother is nature
Mother is nurture
Mother Nature is Mother
Mother is who I need to separate from to become me
Mother has a wound
Mother is who’s wound I must heal
Mother is who I trust
Mother is who I roll my eyes to
Mother is almost always woman
Mother is taken for granted
Mother is who rejects me and I reject
Mother is who I feel smothered by
Mother is who I am
Mother and daughter
Daughter to my mother
Mother to my daughter
May I feel all the wounds
May I speak them
May I heal all the wounds
May I heal my mother wound
May we give back to all mothers
All women
May we give back to Mother Nature
May I give back to my mother
May I give a new future to my daughter
Mother is the beginning
The rhythm of breath
The strum of the heart
Of all that is me and isn’t me
Of unity and division
Mother is the beginning of love
The day yields forth precious dewdrops
in the hour when all lie sleep.
I sit.
I sit and read.
I sit and write.
I sip mint and nettle tea slowly.
I let dark chocolate melt on my tongue
until it is only a reminiscence of itself.
I feel the tiredness behind my eyes.
I savor the delicious
silence around me.
In this time to be me for me.
I feel the radiance
of all the other versions of me.
I sip mint tea and ponder
the raindrops falling.
She recreates the world
one breath at a time.
Silently I wonder
at its beauty.
Beneath the boughs
snowflakes fall.
Each an archipelago
of sacred mystery.
I take in the magic:
slow sips of nectar
lift my heart,
fill me with her symphony.
artwork by Nicholas Roerich
Shine your light into the darkness.
Behold the flickering
fall of shadows.
Echoing and thinning
booming and blossoming.
Their dance brings you back to the sacred circle.
Ardently burns the little flame.
Candid, as a rose, she opens your heart.
You stand beneath the trees.
Whisper into the wild cold of the night.
Stars tingle. Owls hoot.
In awe, each moment, a little deeper
you find your journey.
I sit by the sea
it whispers to me,
secrets I’ve heard
a long time ago.
Between echo and wave,
glimmers I hold
of stories told.
In which Heroines,
alone, rode in the wind
their tale to be sung.
A long white veil
draped on my face.
The wild mist before
dancing on the shore.
Soaring the seagulls
call to the sea.
Their cry arcane
cuts through to my bone.
Sing into the deep December darkness.
Sing into your light.
Walk, one footstep at a time,
into your heart.
Feel the pulsing beat.
Know that you are alive.
Smile because it’s a gift.
Skip because deep down you
still are a child.
Look up, see the moon, the stars,
the forest, the mountains, and the ocean.
Thank them deeply: they are a part of you.
Embrace all of creation, every being,
every human, and animal.
Soothe your caustic tongue.
Walk deeper and past, out of anger.
Feel the love, the deep appreciation,
the belonging of one and all.
The smell of crushed mint leaves lingers
on my fingers, mixing with sweat
and heat. It’s the heart of summer.
Full moon: one lunar year since
you, my baby, were born.
The sun is beating relentlessly, turning
the grass to burnt gold; the earth a fine powder.
Pine needles crackle under my soles.
The dry air redolent of blackberries, spruce and dust.
There isn’t one cloud above. It hasn’t
rained in months. Trees are dying
in the dry summer heat.
Forests to the east of us are on fire.
You and I are inseparable companions. As I carry you,
sweat pours down my skin bin droplets and streams.
I sing, you coo, and point. One finger
extended from a pink hand. Your face in the shade
of your white sun hat. The sky is so blue it hurts.
My toes painted yellow
like ten winking dandelions. Cut off jeans
any shorter would be a bikini bottom.
Hair tumbling in a waterfall down my spine.
Each day brings us to the lake to get in the water.
We feel its mermaid coolness on our skin:
blue-green with mossy branches on its bottom,
algae afloat, willows stooping over it.
You splash and shout with glee, as I lift you in the air,
and back in the water. Ducks swim
and dive under. A dog barks in the distance.
The sun shines yellow in my soul
Violet, I watch you come to life.
You open outward from a pearly,
bud. The motion of life written
in you, a spiraling, curling beauty;
always reminding me
of the mysteries that lie
in the sacred.
Yours isn’t the linear line dear
to Man and the rational mind.
It is the Mother’s way.
In you Nature shows
her hidden power.
I watch your majestic purple
unfolding over days. You move
as though a creature
asleep; curled in on yourself,
a timid child with rounded fists
hovering over her eyes.
You glisten. Your velvet stem
of emerald and magenta,
has grown fine hairs
that whisper against the light.
Each day you peer
out a bit further.
From your head a cup of leaves
unfurls to protect their golden,
inner treasure. Deep, royal violet,
fresh and cool. In them the thirst
of life moves visibly through veins
of love and hope.
I hear your music. The melody
sounds in my ear, singing
the beginning of renewed life.
In your presence I remain
in awe each day a little deeper.
The apple blossoms pink and white.
We sit sprawled out on a blanket
that belonged to nonna in our backyard.
You are eight months old.
Your whole body is round and lovely.
You have soft full cheeks and the bluest of eyes.
You play busily, observing the world,
flowers, bees, branches, specks of dirt.
Interspersed into every action
are the looks you steal at me, furtive, gleeful, curious.
There are moments when you laugh
in short staccato ha-has,
your whole face puckered in an impish grin.
I am imbued by a love so wide and deep
words fail to paint its full picture.
I look at the apple blossoms, and wonder
whether we will have apples this year.
There is a serendipitous connection
between my fertile outburst and the trees’.
Life moves in mysterious ways.
You are holding up one of the pieces of the rainbow,
the yellow one, thrusting your arm
back and forth in happy motion.
I look at you, at my life.
I feel complete.
oona's looking glass 