Bloom

Pink dawn rolled down
the mountain this morning
like a loose armful of peonies--
a reminder that dreams of
May push up through fields
of snow and bloom anyway.

Prayer for a Winter's Evening

Please help me to love this

season of cold and snow.

Help me to see the beauty of

bare branches, hard and slim and dark--

Of stiff wheat-colored grasses

draped in white and sparkled ice--

Of a chilled pink moon rising steady

Over the crest of a powdered mountain.

Or

If I can't see these things

and sing praise, then

please let me thank this 

season of cold and snow

for giving and giving away

to the riot of daffodils

that follows.

Communication

The last lucid conversation I had
With my father went like this:
I took his hand--
already so white,
already so cold--
And said thank you for
teaching me how to . . .

His eyes popped open then
And he finished my sentence.
. . . to communicate?
I laughed and said yes.
That.
Of course.

I can't remember now, three years later,
What it was I meant to say that night
With the snow falling quiet
Outside and all around.
But I'm glad I said what I did.
My father and I,
We communicated.

Blue (for Lisa)

It was a hard December this year.

Ornaments that usually wrap warmth

Around me like a quilt 

Made me cry instead--

The clay angel I made with Becky

In her kitchen while snow fell soft outside

And the radio hummed soft inside—

The enamel rocking horse ridden by three little boys 

My sister-in-law sent me

From New York the Christmas after 

We had lost a fourth—

The pipe cleaner elf sitting on a 

Tinsel chair that hung from my childhood tree

When my father, unknowing of his future,

Scrambled in the moment to create designs

For teams of teenage boys with stiff crewcuts,

Drawing x’s and o’s on a yellow pad of paper

While I sat on his lap and wondered what

This strange map meant--

At first I tried to unhear the song 

Of losses that curved through this December’s air

Around me until finally I accepted it,

Placed the notes of that song on the altar 

Of my heart and allowed it to be what it wanted,

What it needed to be.

Blue.

Be Still

Stop folding that mound of laundry

and give yourself permission 

to lie on your bed like a snow angel

for as long as it takes

to watch this evening's moon

through your window

rise slow--as slow as silver--

up from the darkening trees.

A Short Thanksgiving Prayer

Be happy in your home and children
and your people and your king
said Odysseus before continuing his journey.
So I am taking his advice
because I am happy in my grown sons
this Thanksgiving season--
in the way they sat around their mother's table
and talked and laughed in voices
that rose and fell and rose and fell
like the waves of a wine-dark sea.

Why You Need Friends

For Nancy

Last year I said I was going to make
Cornbread muffins for Thanksgiving Day.
You stopped in the middle of the sidewalk,
Sharp and sudden as a pony ready to throw its rider.

"Muffins?" you asked, the disdain and disbelief
Dripping from your usually calm voice
Like water before it turns to ice.
"Instead of rolls?"

"Well, yes," I said, "because corn.
Corn is a Thanksgiving thing."
I was bluffing, though.
I admit that freely.

Muffins are easier to make than rolls,
Which require a lover's commitment--
The mixing and the kneading,
The rolling and the rising and the time.

But you. You fixed me with a chilly stare.
"You need rolls for Thanksgiving Day
And for the days that follow
Because sandwiches."

So I made yeasty rolls--not cornbread--
And feasted on them Thanksgiving Day and
On the snow-filled days that followed.
Thank you, Nancy, for setting me straight.