Questions About Place Can you ever really know a place? You show up, dwell in it for a short time or long, but you never know its whole history. What happened here before- a day ago, a decade, a centu...Read More
I Want to Learn Instead of rushing to resolution, insisting on an instant fix, I want to learn to clear a space for the difficult questions. I would sweep away the debris around it, the panic and proj...Read More
Still Small Voice I don’t need to tell you all that I am anxious about. Just watch the news, look at social media. There are a thousand voices screaming it out. I cannot add anything to this hurting...Read More
Generosity It took most of a lifetime for her to understand that it wasn’t so much gifts or kind deeds as it was something much simpler and more challenging. It was a willingness to enter another pe...Read More
Season And now, leaves are just beginning to droop, elderberries, overripe, are dropping, tomatoes have taken on their late season tang, and there are apples, so many apples. We are between. It is no ...Read More
Living Within The Mystery The older I get, the less I seem to “know”, the more I realize that we humans look for answers more than the truth because answers, even if not quite right, help to quell...Read More
This Train That Is My Life “The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.” Hans Hofman I wouldn’t say that it is speeding by, but it is moving at a ...Read More
A Tree Falls in the Forest Sitting here on the cabin porch, all of a sudden in the distance, a loud crack, a whoosh, and a monumental thud. Then a reverential silence. A great giant has fallen. A sing...Read More
Home I like to be the first one home in the afternoon, to find the house silently waiting. The books rest on the shelf, leaning gently to the left. The table holds the candlestick benevolently in its ...Read More
Thank you, Dear Body Thank you, dear body, for embracing my spirit so steadfastly, for the unfaltering rhythm of breath and heartbeat all these many years. Thank you, dear body, for drawing all you ne...Read More
Learning Time I remember childhood’s summer, hot days flowing into cooler cicada evenings, unmarked by names of days or even months. Just ‘wadda ya wanna do now?’ My brother and I ride our bikes...Read More
Retrospect Sure. Looking back, you tell yourself, you would have done things differently. You should have tried harder, been more patient. You could have done more. But retrospect is an observation to...Read More
Solitude On a blessedly quiet morning after an overstimulating yesterday, I am thinking about my yearning for solitude. Not just an hour here or there to “recharge the battery” so I can get up and...Read More
Foremothers’ Solace Late afternoon, waning sunlight streaming in, the familiar, repetitive work of keeping a household afloat finished for the day, I rest. It occurs to me how hard my foremothers mu...Read More
Home Again Soul As a child I thought my soul Was an organ That sat In my breastless chest. Pure, As white as a cloud, A cotton ball, A baby blanket, Downy soft, A place where The Holy Spirit dove Coul...Read More
Tiny Paradise I don’t know anything. I just watch these birds in childlike wonder. Two little wrens in the leatherwood outside the porch, a flicker, working its way down the walnut tree. Oh, they li...Read More
Younger Self I can see her there, looking confident, cocky even, but I know her well. She is terrified, has no idea what she is supposed to do with this “life” that is now, suddenly, hers. I wonde...Read More
Today I have borne up, taken the blows, adapted to reality again and again, made the best of it, encouraged and taken care of others. But some days, I just have to stand still and let sadness work its...Read More
In June All around me, there are worlds within and beyond my world inviting me to let go of my preoccupations and enter. The mourning dove coos a deep lullaby from afar, quieting my bothered mind. A s...Read More
I wrote this one over five years ago and still feel the same way. On Turning Sixty I am not old. But I can see old there on the horizon. Which has always been true, I suppose. Its just that now, I don...Read More
Book Review The main character has kept me company for a while now on quiet afternoons, has coaxed me back to sleep on anxious nights. Against the backdrop of a particular moment in history in a parti...Read More