Go!

Keep it brief. Cut to the quick –
well, quickly. A friend is fond
of saying, "Eat your dessert first.
If you die in the middle of your
meal, God doesn't care whether
you ate your broccoli." There
you have it, folks. Case closed.

Now, you can hem-haw around
and rattle off a list of all the
reasons this is not sound advice.
Some would be legitimate. The
fly who eats the elephant does
not do it, well, quickly. But nor
does she wait to start. Start. Go!

Still More

I may not know much, but I've learned
enough to feel this in my solar plexus:
hoarding is a cancer that siphons off life
force, as surely as a stag, shot mortally, 

bleeds out. Joy must flow; abundance is
in movement. I have only just begun to
practice swimming in this current. My
limbs are clumsy, inelegant. I learn, but
slowly. I aspire to grace, long for friends
with whom to share this river, its bounty.
To try to keep it to myself would be to
trigger stillbirth. No. Here, take some.
Hold it just long enough to receive its
nourishment. Release. Invite still more.

 

Stuff the hunger with empty bulk, it will
not disappear. Gag it with the nothing on

offer here, it will not be silent. Shove
sawdust down its gullet, it will not die.
It will swell and choke, spew all manner
of bile, twist and writhe, vomit up all the

force-fed fraud, in desperation to be felt.

 

Dwell in possibility and draw
some of it forward. Coax it

through the narrow passage
that leads to Being, the birth
canal by which it joins the
ranks of those burdened with
the gift of Life. It may – no,
who are we kidding – it will
take more than coaxing. It
will require some pushing,
some pulling, some prodding,
and no small measure of
pain and peril to bring forth
that which wants to be here,
that which here wants to be.

Then, Begin

This belongs here. This knot,
feel it. Feel it bunched beneath
your xyphoid process, crowding
your diaphragm. Don't fight it.
Don't try to push it further down
or squeeze it into a tighter ball
to tuck behind your gall bladder
like so many broken scissors
shoved to the back of the junk
drawer. That's how you get cut.
Hold it a minute. Like an angry
child, it is probably just sad, in
need of a long, long hug. Ask
what it needs. Listen, of course,
and then listen some more, as
the knot rattles off its usual list
of short-lived salves. Say, Go
on, and What else? and Tell
me more, until it is spent, quiet
and pliable. Don't be surprised
if it lets you pull it out at that
point, lets you cradle it in the
crook of your left arm as you
gently pull a strand to the side
of its tight little body, wiping
a tear with the knuckle of your
index finger. We can work on
this, you say. We can get you
out of this mess. Then, begin.

Finishing School

We had only begun to learn, only started

to see the patterns to which our Teacher
pointed our infant attention. And we
thought it was enough. In our juvenile
arrogance, we mistook the part –
the smallest of parts – for the whole,
spurned our Teacher, assumed we could
do better than her billions of years' experience,
declared ourselves her lords and masters, and
subjected her to our crude machinations.

Perhaps she anticipated this. Perhaps she
knew this was the risk she ran in undertaking
to educate us. Perhaps that is why she set so
many reserves aside – to let us play out the
fantasies of our ungovernable adolescence,
before recovering the wonder of childhood
and the promise of sober co-creation as adults.

It must've been hard, gambling on us like that.
It must be hard still, knowing that the game is
far from over, that she – we – may lose the bet.
It remains to be seen whether we will submit
ourselves to loving tutelage, whether we will
return to our Teacher, as penitent prodigals,
and complete our courses of instruction.

There has to be a way.
There has to be a path.
There has to be a route
to get to a place,
to dwell in a place,
to grow in a place
where the soul feels free,
where it dares to fly,
where it learns enough
to know it is home.

 

Meditations of a Fly Fisher

The only thing I know for sure
is that I know jack diddly squat.
Nothin'. Nada. Zippo. Zilch.
Would you like bacon with that
Goose Egg? Toast instead? On
a good day, I might fancy I've
squirreled a few acorns away,
may even produce one for you
from my pocket. But most days –
and those are better than good,
mind you – I know I got empty
pockets and a noggin full o'
river rocks. But that's where it
gets interesting, 'cause those
rocks have seen some shit – the
good, the bad, the better, the
best the world has to offer has
passed over those rocks in cloud
and current. Those rocks were
forged in fire and pressure, then
broken, weathered, smoothed by
water, motion, and friction, their
comrades mineralized and taken
up by snails eaten by the rainbow
trout that made its way, by fly
line and filet knife, into this pan,
frying in butter over open flame.

Will-o'-the-Wisp

Freedom walks many paths, but avoids many too,
saving them for another time, perhaps, or simply

heeding the whisper of the will-o'-the-wisp:
Not for you, dear – hear, here is your way, and

she flickers and flits to a magical trace, trailing
light dust in her wake, just enough to invite your
curiosity or, if you're practiced, to elicit your
longing. Is this path long? Is it lonely? She does

not say, only dances three steps ahead, giggling
as she goes, turning fear into play with each of
your footfalls on the forest floor, wending a way
into dusk, then dark, enticing you to follow, free.