A Long Perspective

Tag: love

  • Sr. Antoinette at the Monastery

    Paris Two 2010 183Now is her quiet season

    all the contemplation

    a meditation within

    all turned inward, a divina lectio.

     

    She said, everything we do

    must be spiritual, bloom with intention,

    a deepening of the spirit, the

    singing of the psalms, the reading of

    the scripture, so that when work

    ceases, the nurturing continues,

    ripening in the secret crevices of the soul.

    A plant deepens its roots

    develops the tiny buds that will

    bloom later. So you, too,

    in that hour, come

    into yourself.

     

    I will write you a note,

    slip it under your closed door, certain

    that your hand will grasp it, your

    eyes will read it, your heart will keep

    me in the prayerful spaces of your being

    until our hands clasp again

    and then, oh yes,

    what rejoicing!

     

    FEWalls

  • At the Nursing Home

    Paris Two 2010 055As I walk in,

    a woman straightens the chair on the patio outside her room.

    Her Easter lily, parched, sits untended, one bloom left.

    As I pass she says, I’m nuts, and blows me kisses,

    her fingers touching her lips and the empty space between us.

     

    One aide plays “string the pearls” with five women,

    then plays “follow the leader”

    and leads them off for rest time.

    Each woman has a place at the table

    and a room of her own.

     

    In one room, ceramic dolls

    in elegant kimonos bow

    in a silent dance.

     

    Into Louise’s room walks a stranger

    saying, where’s my false teeth,”

    sure she left them here.

     

    The rhodies by Louise’s window

    at the peak of their exuberance

    bloom red and sturdy, as if

    they will never droop

    or leave the walkway carpeted with softness.

     

    An aide comes to her room,

    hands white with rubber gloves.

    She puts her arm around Louise,

    turns her away from me, and chats about the weather

    as I slip away.

     

    I was never there.

     

    FEWalls

  • Departure

    IMG_0851

    His scent lingers

    near his bedroom door,

    I sniff the air –

    a startled deer –

    then feel his absence

    in the molted room.

  • Farewell

    Paris 2010 054When

    I am turned to ash

    I want you

    knowing

    that I hear your footfalls

    in the ancient forest,

    the scream of hawks,

    the water crazy-mad flowing

    down to the sea

     

    and I want

    you knowing

    that I see you

    on your knees in the garden

    your hands a riot of colors

    poppies, begonias, columbine and larkspur

    that grow beneath you, beside you, near you

     

    and I want you

    knowing that I feel

    your beating heart

    a still-questing spirit

    even with everything that has happened

    so when I am ash

    you will have these words

    to sustain you.

  • Denial

    IMG_0297_1That slip of the mind

    That momentary disengagement

    Like the clutch in the old Dodge

     

    I think: I have to get a message to her

    Then: how can I get a message to her

    As if it were a problem I could puzzle out and solve

     

    Then I remember.

    All this in a heartbeat

     

     

    FEWalls