My Name Is Not Mavis

Field of Wonder

I have set up my tent in a field
Of wonder and secured
The flimsy lines with heavy rocks
And feverish prayers
That my home will hold.
But, I remind myself, when the
Pressure drops and weather looms,
When the worst hits and I lose it all,
Again. I can lay on my back
And watch the storm.
Writing my stories of epic fates,
While the wind howls through the
Loose atoms of my vulnerable being.

Live and Learn

Vulnerability sits on the very highest
Step of the staircase.
When you approach, make sure
The hand that holds yours
Will steady you, not give you a
Sneaky push that makes you tumble
Downward in rageful frustration
That you allowed it again.

The Mountains

What welling within from knowing
That mountains grow
And oceans carefully polish
And shame the sand bit by bit.
Just as the hand of a god we cannot see
And can’t believe in caresses our fates
With promises and hopes and failings.
And just when, just when it is too much,
The welling inside and relief of knowing
That trees whisper amongst themselves
Underground as valleys sink and the sun
Continues to promise tomorrow,
Consistently rising today from
The place it left yesterday somewhere else
Overhead of someone you will
Never meet but who has a heartbeat like yours
And a hand that aches to be held.
So perhaps that is the welling;
The awe of billions of souls you share and
Will never know except for the few that
Step hard on your path on their way somewhere
Else. Like the coyotes who crisscross
The desert or the old skinny cougar that
Lurks in the grasses along the highway
And watches unseen. Just like god.
Just like the telling of our
Fortunes by the whispers in the wind
And the shifting of the planets
If you believe in all that and even if you don’t
It is merely the same as a ticking clock that
Directs all our senses with hardly any sensibility.
This is my welling as I sit and think about
The mountains outside my window growing
Well before and well beyond anything I will ever be.

You Can Be My Everything, She Said.
But Understand This:

Like the sun in the sky
That knows the stars are simply waiting
For the brightness to depart,
You can not be my only thing.

Not There Yet

I will hold the beyond
In my mouth until I can speak
In a way that is a scattershot
Of grace not gravel.