Billie Holiday and a Constancy of Dishes

growing into what goodly work feels like, allowing

Billie Holiday to meet a Sunday afternoon, a moment to rest

sultry trumpet lines and mellow tenor sax vibratos curl

around the soft razz of her story, falling in sensual serenades from

her lips, tragedy, truth, the fact that things fall apart, and fall

together again all in one song, one heart, one lifetime

a slow, delicious meal simmering on the stove to be

shared with my dearest, a quick sear to seal in flavor

so as I wash these dishes, may I remember Brother Lawrence

1666 Carmelite monk whose work became to wash the

dishes– pots, pans, spoons, bowls– whose devotion

to paying mind and body to the menial task became

a meditation, a prayer, a conversation, an act of deep adoration

to the point of nourishing brother lawrence in joy

joy at the least of these, the insignificant existence of humans,

recorded as the stuff of worshipers, acolytes, viewers, and tourists

over the ages who watched brother lawrence wash, in soverignty,

dishes

every dish evidence that life was given, bread was broken, food and

tidying up became an act of physical communion

Dance

sometimes I’ve climbed back into the dress
I wore when we danced together for the last time

we inhabited two separate bodies, two separate lives, we danced with
all of our experiences swirling inside of us, there is seemingly nothing

that could save us from the next part of the dance. undone, again, I am
sad, it’s a different sadness, not the raw, aching fire of the first separation

not the low moaning tears of the days the boys had to leave to be with you
it’s a sadness more of recognition, of assent, nodding ‘yes’ to what was

and accepting what is, and allowing myself to still feel sad that I didn’t
know, could never have known, it would be our last dance

A Certain Slant of Light

the clouds rise in great crescendos
thunderheads of nimbostratus, portent
like that mahler record of resurrection
nestled in the thrift store vinyl section
life and death and redemption
those rays of light we all see
which break through the somber
sky, a promise,
who knows the rules, who keeps them
when it comes to poetry, lightning
mercury, fate, spirit, a palantir