Watching the moon

at dawn,

solitary, mid-sky,

I knew myself completely,

no part left out.

― Izumi Shikibu

It takes a long time not to feel like an alien, a long time to search out and discover who you are. But if you go all the way with that exploration it takes you beyond race, beyond colour, beyond class, beyond every kind of category, and you discover you belong to humanity. And that's who you are. If you go all the way with that search, it takes you beyond property, beyond lumber, fish, furs, metal, oil, beyond "resource" industry, beyond commercial food production to where you find you belong to the land. And that's who you are. And when you are that, there is no foreign land. Wherever you are is home. And the earth is paradise and wherever you set your feet is holy land.

--Wilfred Peltier

Wilfred Pelletier (also Peltier), or Baibomsey, meaning "traveller," Odawa wise man, philosopher, author (b on Wikwemikong Reserve, Manitoulin I, Ont 16 Oct 1927; died at Ottawa 2 Jul 2000). https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/wilfred-pelletier 

Fresh

To move

Cleanly.

Needing to be

Nowhere else.

Wanting nothing

From any store.

To lift something

You already had

And set it down in

A new place.

Awakened eye

Seeing freshly.

What does that do to

The old blood moving through

Its channels?

--Naomi Shihab Nye

Take Love for Granted

Assume it’s in the kitchen,

under the couch, high

in the pine tree out back,

behind the paint cans

in the garage. Don’t try

proving your love

is bigger than the Grand

Canyon, the Milky Way,

the urban sprawl of L.A.

Take it for granted. Take it

out with the garbage. Bring

it in with the takeout. Take

it for a walk with the dog.

Wake it every day, say,

“Good morning.” Then

make the coffee. Warm

the cups. Don’t expect much

of the day. Be glad when

you make it back to bed.

Be glad he threw out that

box of old hats. Be glad

she leaves her shoes

in the hall. Snow will

come. Spring will show up.

Summer will be humid.

The leaves will fall

in the fall. That’s more

than you need. We can

love anybody, even

everybody. But you

can love the silence,

sighing and saying to

yourself, “That’ s her.”

“That’s him.” Then to

each other, “I know!

Let’s go out for breakfast!”

--Jack Ridl

Insomnia

All over the world, people can’t sleep.

In different time zones, they are lying awake,

Bodies still, minds trudging along like child laborers.

They worry about bills.

They worry whether the shoes they just bought are really too small.

One’s husband died, her son left for college, and she doesn’t know how to program the VCR.

Another was beaten by her husband.

One is planning a getaway.

One holding stolen goods.

One’s on the plaid couch in ICU.

His daughter, it turned out, actually does have a brain tumor even though the doctor said they’d do the MRI just to rule it out.

The woman on the other couch is snoring — which is strangely soothing — evidence that people do sleep.

Some are lying on Charisma sheets.

Some in hammocks.

Some in jail.

Some under bridges.

One is at the North Pole studying the impact of pollution.

A man in Massachusetts thinks about a lover he once had in Dar es Salaam and the jasmine blossoms she strung along the shaft of a silver pin, fastened in her hair at night.

Coincidentally, the lover, now in Rome, remembers looking out the window over the sink when she was washing dishes and seeing him reading in the lawn chair.

And she thought how, perhaps for the first time, she wasn’t lonely.

They’re all up.

Some are too cold.

Some too hot.

Some hungry.

Some in pain.

Some are in hotels listening to people have sex in the next room.

Some are crying.

One the cat woke up and now she’s worried about the rash she noticed in the evening and wonders if her daughter, who’s afraid to swim, should be pushed.

Some get up.

Others stay in bed.

They eat Oreos.

Or drink wine.

Or both.

Many read.

A few make Halloween costumes.

Some check their email.

They try sleep tapes, hypnosis, drugs.

They listen to their clocks tick, smartly as a woman in high heels.

Those who can, cling to their mates, an ear pressed to those neighbouring lungs like a stethoscope, hoping to catch a ride on the steady sleep breath of the other. To be carried like a seed on the body of the one who is able.

Right now, in Japan, dawn is coming.

And everyone who’s been up all night is relieved.

They can stop trying.

In Guatemala though, the insomniacs are just getting started and they have the whole night ahead of them.

It’s like a wave at the baseball stadium, hands around the world.

So here’s a prayer for the wakeful,

for the souls who can’t rest:

As you lie with eyes open or closed,

may something comfort you — a mockingbird, a breeze, the smell of crushed mint, Chopin’s nocturnes, your child’s birth, a kiss, or even me — at 3 am, in my chilly kitchen with my coat over my nightgown — thinking of you.

--Ellen Bass

Skin Tight

The internal organs were growling

According to them

They did all of the work while

Skin got all of the attention

He’s an organ just like us

They groused

Even the heart, which, a

Century ago, was the Queen

Of metaphors, but now

Was reduced to the greetings

Cards section of CVS,

Chimed in

They decided to call skin

On the carpet.

Skin arrived from Cannes

Where he’d been the subject

Of much fuss as actresses

Fed him luxurious skin

Food prepared by Max Factor

Estée Lauder, L’Oreal,

And Chanel

They

Caressed him daily

Sometimes for hours before

They made the red carpet

Shine

He was petted

And preened

Others

Pleaded with him

To erase wrinkles to

Make them look younger

To tighten their chins

Skin tried to appease the

Critics, greeting them with

His familiar “give me some skin”

But his gesture went unheeded

Brain did all the talking

Brain said, “Here’s the skinny

Why do you get

All of the press

Your color

Your texture discussed

Endlessly

Nicole Kidman never

Did an ad about us

Cole Porter never

Wrote a song about us

Nor were we mentioned

In a Thornton Wilder novel

You’ve given us no

Skin in the game”

“What about the nasty

Things they say about

Me,” skin replied

“What about skin deep

For superficiality

Or

Skin trade

To denote something

Unsavory

How would you

Like acne rashes

Eczema

Boils

Pellagra

Leprosy

And

Conditions

That astonish

Even dermatologists

I wear my blemishes

In public while you guys

Hide yours”

“Without me and heart

You’d be nothing,” the brain said

“That’s not true,” protested

The liver, “without me he’d

Be nothing”

“No,” the kidney said

“It’s me who keeps the

Body functioning”

The bladder and

The kidney began

To quarrel with

Gallbladder

The lung twins spoke

Up

“Without us

He couldn’t breathe”

Even the esophagus

And the thyroid

And the pancreas

Joined the outbreak

“What about us?”

The eyes said

“Without eyes you

Can’t see”

Their squabble distracted

Them

When they looked

Up from their dust up

Skin’s

Helicopter was up

He was scheduled to

Address a convention of

Plastic surgeons at

The Beverly Hills

Hotel

Escaping by the skin

Of his teeth

His opponents gave

Chase

But above the roar

Of the chopper

They heard him say

“Don’t worry fellas

I got you covered”

--Ishmael Reed

 If we could read the secret history of our enemies we should find in each man's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility. 

--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

For a New Beginning

In out-of-the-way places of the heart,

Where your thoughts never think to wander,

This beginning has been quietly forming,

Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire,

Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,

Noticing how you willed yourself on,

Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety

And the gray promises that sameness whispered,

Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,

Wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,

And out you stepped onto new ground,

Your eyes young again with energy and dream,

A path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not yet clear

You can trust the promise of this opening;

Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning

That is at one with your life’s desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;

Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;

Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,

For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

--John O’Donohue