goddess #52

no sunbathers here today

only rain and surf

washing the ancient rocks that line the shore.

fifty-two weeks ago

on a bright sunny day
the first goddess found her place 

way down the other end of the beach.

today her sister sits in the rain.

same beach, only different

same ocean, only different

same goddess, only different

same me, only different.

the goddesses, the weeks, the places

dissolve into one another

like this goddess

dissolving into the wet greyness

of rocks and sea and sky.

goddess #51

rain threatens today

not the devastating floods drowning pakistan,

nor the downpours succeeding drought and fire in russia,

nor any of the other numberless disasters across the globe.

just a polite new england rain

washing clean the puddingstone,

falling on the plastic bags, food wrappers, and assorted debris 

scattered by the weather front known as homo sapiens.

in a thousand years

will we still be here?

casting about our stuff?

seeing only ourselves?

or will have learned to breathe with the body of the earth?

to see with the eyes of all beings?
in a thousand years will we finally understand with the mind of all that is?

goddess #50

business is booming here at the dunkin' 

in the state of "live free or die".

but i'm drawn past the edge where the mowing ends 

and the weeds grow high,

thinking that "live free and die" is perhaps more apt,

since the "dying" part is really not optional,

and the "living free" part is easier said than done.

and i think of janice singing 'bout how 

"freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose."

and i think perhaps she's right -

how slowly divesting,

letting go of things -

of ideas

of what's right and wrong

important

necessary

essential

safe or dangerous -

makes it just a little easier 

to walk past the edge

and sit among wild blackberries

listen to cicadas

and enjoy the goldenrod brilliant against the summer sky.

goddess #49

some urban artist assembled sheet metal

carving out ciphers on this hillside,

then erected sentinels to watch over the weeds as they grew,

softening the edges of the steel-framed beds.

i imagine squashes growing here,

their golden blossoms bright among eggplants, tomatoes, cukes and kale,

nourishing this neighborhood on the other side of the tracks.

i see pumpkins ripening in the sun, 

peas and beans adorning the chain link fence,

and a woman, young and vibrant, who perished nearby - 

wiped out as she pedaled home some years ago.

she would have smiled to see a garden growing.

goddess #48

sisters - separated by endless loops of razor wire that sparkle in the sun

me - free to come and go, to make the countless small decisions that determine my life

you - confined by endless rules and the barked commands of crackley loud speakers,

indecipherable to me, but understood by you, the result of long practice and necessity.

and yet, we are the same.

it could have been me on your side of the wire if causes and conditions had been different.

it could have been you on this side.

and so we breathe slowly, in and out

sense our bodies sitting here, alive in this very moment

and learn to be free and to know that we are one.

goddess #47

a beaver dam dressed in green - 

strawberries, blueberries, moss, and ferns.

the lake three feet above where i stand with an eerie sense

of the built and the unbuilt.

earlier mineral hard land gave way to delicate new ferns, then rich forest humus . . 

then opened to this vista of water, lilies, and trees.

i am touched by tiny winged beings 

and remember how many of them there are compared to us -

some incredible number of times our biomass-

and i can only stop
and breathe it all in

as an inchworm makes her way across my page.

goddess #46

a pause

in this day that cycles between downpour and brilliance

the kind of day where there might be a rainbow

but isn't

only the wet lushness of green moss

mist rising from the earth

and a thousand other shades of green

gladdened by the arrival of sudden storms.