journey

Autumn again

| Megan
Deschutes River as seen from Bend, Oregon

FTS
(F**ck that Sh!t)

Didn’t we all make promises?
Didn’t we all say yes to caring for each other?

And yet, here we stand with the truth the we
Must be our own golden mean, our own magic

We had nothing to do with the wild universe that
Called us into existence, except for that we have made

A pact, a promise to ourselves, that we 
Would live each day to honor our mitochondria

To uplift our own atoms, to love the Starrdust 
Of others– to kin-keep, to break bread, to

Carry things on our heads and backs, and hearts
And sometimes we have to break the promise

To set the other free, to honor our sovereignty
And perhaps, that is the gift of grief, those

Tendrils of sadness and severed nerves which 
Feel so raw, so new, so in need of protection

Cradle all of us in. The letting go. The setting
Apart, the making into two, and the reconstitution

Of family, of friends, of tables and candlelight 
A twilight override, a play it again, Sam

A journey that has always been one of the heart
That can really only view and visit the other through

A window– soul to soul, sex to sex, human to 
Human, heart to heart, I am that I am

Broken Top, Three Sisters Wilderness, Deschutes National Forest, Oregon (2025).

Falling Forward

It’s not very often I’m privy to an American football game
I prefer soccer, to be honest, or lacrosse, or even rugby
… Any other sport, but I was watching the epic
eternal battle (they call it the holy war) between the red and the blue
And my partner pointed out that one of the quarterbacks

Knew how to perform a ballet for each play, each pass, they
laser-focused their eyes, their body, their entire being
On the intention, the target, even after it left their hands,
yes, they fell forward, toward the play, toward the action
each time, there was not even a hint of indecision in

Their gaze, and it got me to thinking about how life
surely requires this, that we fall forward, that we
look to our most noble intentions with laser-focus
With longing, we’ll be so set on our goal that we’ll
Fall that direction, a ballet for each day

South Sister, Oregon

1.0 Human

a documentary
something about
education and
technology

the second clip
is Ken Jennings
you know, Jeopardy
most-winner who

explains that we have
already been bested by
the technology “gods’
all I can think

is, I’ll never be
ready for this
I’ll always want
bodies, and touch,

and direct instruction
eyes lit by
the sun and that
wondrous gray glob

of matter synapsed
by neurons
I need flesh over
algorithms every

day and the fact
that the bots
spell rhythm
with an i

(lower case) is all
you need to know
about the state of
humanity

I’m slated for the
scrap pile dust
to dust
my god

Weave

| Megan
Hoar Frost. December 2024. Image, my own.

Chancel

And now I bow
In the nave
I built with my
Own hands
A force of will
Maybe, and of
Hope, and strength
And love, and
Power, and good
Ness and weak
Ness and sacrifice
And longing and
Grief and beginning
I kneel before this
Altar to my dreams
Before I burn
It down, before
The doing and
Undoing pulse
Through my being
And there it is
Again, my knowing
In the unknowing
That this temple
This altar this
Divine expression
Must ignite, must
Burn, must be made
Into ash, and thereby
Made into everything
That comes after–
The garden, the
Synagogue, the holiest
Holy, of all the sacred
Spaces, filled with the
Breath, the Fire of the
Divine Universe intoned
In your throat, in your
Heart, in your center
Melted to make
Way for something New

Wintery walk. Image, my own.

Gift

Sometimes the memories
And myths that were woven
Into your childhood become
Magic again to your arcing
Soul. The songs that break
Forth in trumpets. The
Prayers that end in good
Tidings. The trees all
Dressed in snow and stars
Light against long December
Nights which beg gathering
And joy-filled repasts

Aspen and snow. Image, my own.

Roads Taken

Two roads diverged in a snowy wood
And knowingly, quiet and somber I stood,
looking out on the starry, moonlit way
then took the path that had already been trod

With careful foot-fall through the hoary frost,
after the ribbon of travelers who’d crossed
the fork in the road, the decision place
And rather than test the dark and the cold

I took the chance to walk along
where others had gone, and bend my care
instead to perceiving the moment, the present
The here, the now, the trees and the fences

I shall be telling this in an age
from maiden, to matron, to crone, to sage,
I took the road that many had paved
And made it my journey, anyway

Fern Frost. Photograph: Skip Via, West Valley Naturalists.

Braid

dark and light
strands of fermion
behavior spin
good
evil
if they
exist
tethered
whole
to the same
fate maybe
driving Dirac’s
trick
as truth
every particle
we are made of
even distantly
is woven, connected
to the cosmological
horizon, all tangled up,
simultaneously unspun
strand by strand into
infinity

Half Moon. Image, my own.

Journey

| Megan
Trees in sun. Image, my own.

Hecate

A torche glitters in her hand, a brightly whishing brand lighting the ways– a choice,
the path you take, the path you don’t, all paths you leave behind– they are
equally lighted by her candle, paths you can see now and will never be

revealed again, in the flickering breath the shadows cast into the recessed
flume, the light loses its brilliance, the gravel of the third way spooled out along
the straighter path, and the second road banking darkly into the far side of some

gray and dusty landscape which even the brighted stars cannot now expose,
So what does this goddess of the dark night and her burning wooden beam
divine, does the curve of her hip signal some portent, message of direction,

no, the way, the path, the journey will not be signaled by another, you
must choose, you must contemplate, intuit, and define your bounds
your path will be yours, after all, your own, so you must own your choice

wavering again, the flame whispers from some fate-wind ahead, some
ancient breath of the beyond, you grip the paper of your healing in your
pocket and take one long breath, exhaled in the rising chill, a mist

spurled ahead, looking up into the star-strewn night the weight of the
choice comes softly on the shoulders of the traveler, an unseen cloak,
take a small but firm step toward the flume, the future

Canemah Bluff Nature Park. Oregon. Image, my own.

Clay

Molded and molding,
shaping, shifting, pressure,
smooth tension, long lines
a steady firmness, spirit of
water, sunlight, earth,
release, become

New Moon Amulet. December 2024. Image, my own.

Talisman

Can any thing be magic?
Any blob of gold or
Pressing of silver, can
An object, an item, a
Pinecone or umber fleck of
Bark be imbued with
Power or general chemistry
That brings transmutational
Ability, alchemy, divination

Canemah Bluff Nature Park. Oregon. Image, my own.

Some grief never leaves

And I know this because of arthritis
Some grief is permanent, the relationship
With a parent that you’ll never have, the
Child who never entered your life, the
Star that never rose in its proper place
There will be some things that leave
Mortally permanent scars, situations
Which will never be shifted into
Redemptive tales. Some scars
Will ever be with us to remind us
How pain and grief bring understanding
Gained in no other way,

Starlight street at night. Fukuōji Kazuhiko.

Journey

It began to ring true
Several steps from where
The grief began, the opening
of the way, the continued rock
and slosh of the water
Eyes opened on a world
And existence that was nothing
Like what tiny kernel of promise
In life began as. Nothing like
the seed of the idea of the life
you thought you’d live, the
contrast was searing and startling
at first. But then, by gradual
degrees, it became whole,
sound, founded, and sacred
opportunity