Wendell Berry:

HOW TO BE A POET
(to remind myself)

Make a place to sit down.
Sit down. Be quiet.
You must depend upon
affection, reading, knowledge,
skill — more of each
than you have — inspiration,
work, growing older, patience,
for patience joins time
to eternity. Any readers
who like your poems,
doubt their judgment.

Breathe with unconditional breath
the unconditioned air.
Shun electric wire.
Communicate slowly. Live
a three-dimensioned life;
stay away from screens.
Stay away from anything
that obscures the place it is in.
There are no unsacred places;
there are only sacred places
and desecrated places.
Accept what comes from silence.
Make the best you can of it.
Of the little words that come
out of the silence, like prayers
prayed back to the one who prays,
make a poem that does not disturb
the silence from which it came.

we sat around the soil, talking about human things, sharing our humanity while our hands dug gnarly weeds out of the clay. chernobyl weeds, the director of the community garden calls them. persistent, lasting. damaging. 

i think about chernobyl this morning while the slight sunburn is rubbed by the collar of my suit. today i'll move through task after task, cheerfully greet visitors to the supreme court, and continue in the weeding that i do at work. but there is a poison beneath my skin threatening me. 

my favorite tree is the ginkgo, its leaves a cheerful yellow during autumn, its unique shape. four of these trees survived the bombing of hiroshima. the internet tells me that ginkgo biloba, the extract of the ginkgo tree, provided adequate protection for recovery workers at chernobyl.

last night i dreamed about standing around with my family. we started a prayer for a meal, and i looked around to see so many familiar and unfamiliar faces. my 'family' was made up of friends from years past, their visitors. there were aunts and uncles i didn't know but felt love for. i hugged a young cousin as we gathered and began to pray. the prayer turned into smatterings of our gratitude, each person mentioning what they were grateful for. it swelled in my chest as i slept- this gratitude, i remember that we were crying as we spoke.

i am protected by the words of my friends and family. the gentle reminders, the smiles and jokes, the sacred sharing. this life offers us poison, unfathomable doses of pain, anxiety, tears, and struggle. i carry the poison of anxiety in my body. i need strong doses of friendship, consistent reminders of my value and my values, the gratitude of my familial body, gathered together with affection, and the calming water of love. with daily doses of this goodness, i am adequately protected from poison. i can continue.

she's in the stars and she's in the trees.

she's in the moment you wake up and squint at the sunshine, watch the way it comes through your window. she's in the evening tea you have before you go to bed. she is in the confident walk you take through the park, she is in the gulp of air before you go underwater, and the jolt of excitement you feel in the airport. breathe the airport air in, it was her favorite. look up at night, through the branches of the trees- you'll see it there, glimmering at you, that star.

she is in the way you wash your dishes. maybe a few of hers have been handed down to you, the wooden spoon worn smooth with her fingers. bake some biscuits, remember her.

hug each other to remind yourself of your humanity. hug each other and pass the torch of her fire from one to another. do a kitchen dance tonight and let her spirit move through you.

when you are walking in the woods, look for the way the evening light touches the golden leaves. it will fade, and come back again. she is there. stop and listen to the way the creek moves, she is there. pet a dog on the street and talk to your neighbor. she is there.

notice. stop you breakneck speed and just take a moment to look around you. curl up in the quilt she handed down to you, i know a few of you have them, so... please stop, breathe, and remember just exactly how lucky you are.

last week when i was spending precious time with my niece/cousin/we haven't really decided what she is to me, she told me, 'I have four talents... drawing, swimming, and climbing. I can't remember the fourth.'

she said it with so much conviction, with so much confidence, this little girl with a boundless insistence on self. she learned, early on, to say 'i just need some time alone.' i remember her telling me that very soon after she learned to talk. our family was downstairs being its enthusiastic, wandering subject, warm embracing self, and she.. just... needed... to be away.

i want to spend time with her, in those quiet moments and in her moments of conviction, to see her spirit grow.i want to let my own spirit soften, become more brave. i want to tick off my talents on my fingertips like she did with me... i want her to be proud of me.

children are so much closer to the deep, the divine. i celebrate her willingness to be quiet and her ability to become enraged. i watch her watch the geese settle into the pond behind my grandparents' house and i soften, her eyes exploring the world. i celebrate her, in all things, and try not to think of the day when the world will try to wield its lies of 'sit down, shut up, be pretty and you will be loved', aiming to shave away her inner power. i will hold on to these moments, remind her later, always celebrate these moments when i see the fire inside of her shine.

day twenty seven

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