8.30.2006

the summer day

who made the world?
who made the swan, and the black bear?
who made the grasshopper?
this grasshopper, i mean -
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down -
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
i don't know exactly what a prayer is.
i do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what i have been doing all day.
tell me, what else should i have done?
doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
- mary oliver

... this poem encompasses my heart's cry, encompasses beauty to me. to just be still and revel in the created glory of the One whom i will never be able to truly comprehend. to remember that life is short, but a breath and it is gone. to ask what will life mean, for it is only one, so wild, and so precious. i long to live it to the full.

8.27.2006

san diego, here i am
like chicago, same
diverse neighborhood
loud streets
ice cream carts.

but with
new people
new space
new reality.

ella fitzgerald and dinner
cool breezes at night
warm sun in the day.

life together?
a good challenge.
i am certain to grow.

before i was the most liberal
and now i feel the most conservative.

all is well.

8.17.2006

and everything in this moment is right.
perfect.
the way the sun shines through the water as i wash my hands and
the perfect warm breeze and
that smell of summer but with a fresh tone to it.
the quietness of the morning and
the hum of the fan and
every now and then a bird mingles with the sounds of the road outside.
it is last night
cicadas and coffee
being loved by a friend who knows
how to care
how to love
and yes, how to flatter
me.
it is long-awaited reading
of poetry, of which i will tell you the author
but not yet the title, for it might give you
preconceptions of what you will hear.
it is a taste of someone else's passion
and the moment that makes
her heart swell.

and the best part of this moment is that
it encompasses true peace, the true mellow
of my heart
and not just the uncomfortable quiet that has been
my last few weeks or months
because i have heard some of the quietest, truest words
that have made the biggest ripples in my heart:
to know that God is real if only because of the rejection,
body and soul, of the statement that He is not.
to ask what is faith but the assurance of things hoped for,
but not yet seen - and so many of them are.
and to remember that there may be victories, but
more often there are losses in this struggle,
that goodness does not always prevail in the time frame of our lives,
but that God will not give up, even if i do, on His goal, His dream,
which will come to be
in the fullness of time.

8.09.2006

undeveloped nature.
berries all around.
qaspeqs and rubber boots.
salmon, or at least a pike.
wind-in-the-face speed on the water.
kuskokwim.
late night games, new friends.
seven-hour fireweed jam-making.
so sweet friendships, savored.
land of the midnight sun.
beautiful bethel.
ak.