Aug 29 2005
I spent my whole life
trying to be
bigger than Life.
Then I discovered
that Life was
Bigger than me.
So I relaxed,
and made tea,
and planted roses.
COMING & GOING - HOME
Serenity Prayer 7-10-06
God, grant me the serenity to Be
consciously and willfully
who and what I am,
Without fear of reprisals or judgement assignments by others,
or of my own making.
Grant me the courage to claim for myself
the joyous freedom just to be me,
To discover myself fully, in all my marvelous
wonderFoolishness, the hi's and the lo's,
And the delightful, sullen and sundry inbetweens,
That I might then extend that Grace to the All Around Me,
becoming a living legacy of Your Grace.
God, grant me the serenity
to Be, Here, Now,
and the courage to change anything, everything
that I have been, thought I've been, done or known
that I might Be at Home, here, now,
thoroughly in my Place and Space
Belonging, at peace with my life, with planet earth,
with You,
Even in the midst of change, chaos, pain and confusion.
Grant me the courage to allow myself to change,
and be changed,
To be worked over surely like a lump of sacred clay,
ready to be kneaded, pinched, cut-or added to -
As Your skillful Hands sculpt me into my full divinity.
God, grant me the serenity
to Be Home now,
The courage to come home to my loving Self,
To walk with awareness as I play our each day,
Neither sparing nor being spared
from Love's complete Embrace.
And grant me the wisdom, God, to know the Difference.
MIRROR, MIRROR
Mirror, can I love this face? Years I can't misplace
chiseled here for all to see,
lines that trace an older me?
Hair, I'll wear you all the way
darkened brown with silvered grey,
no more denial, me on trial
for sporting lines around my smile.
Lines etched clearly into face:
Let no anxious creme erase...
Mirrored age spots dot my arm,
Need acceptance, not alarm.
Sixty now -with elder skin
summer tanned, worn and thin-ning...
Girlchild, Woman, Crone -- hold space
inside this skin, outside this face.
Love my lines, hair peppered brown:
It's rather nice, my greying crown?!
Mirror, Mirror, no more frown.
Aging Mirror, go to town.
CREATIVITEASE
June 21, 2001
Shall I sing for you? Lullabyes if you're tired,
or maybe (you'd like) something more inspired?
Or I could just make tones,
Sweet and low, or fast and in drones. -Would you like me
to dance?
Put you in trance?
Or compose a song, about the story of your life...
Write a poem, or draw a cartoon about you and your strife
Oh, I know,
Make a healing mask, and collage it all over
Or make a stick dolly, - make one of rover!
Or a family of puppets, in the Theater of the Self
do special improv games, I've got a wealth
of ideas,
But you have a headache... Hey let's enact it !
I'm your head, you're the ache, I'll act, you'll react it.
Better yet, I'll consult your DNA instead,
Read a past life right out of your head!
We could add costumes, something sublime:
Too much trouble? Well, let's just do mime!
We can set up a stage in my living room,
Or outside in my garden, in full living bloom
Make a tall tent theater, or wait, go to the beach
Build a stage out of driftwood,
Don't worry, I'll teach
you how -let's bring along colored pens
and write affirmations for making amends
On paper hearts - I'll bring strong instant glue
in case were assembling a 3D collage or two
adding sticks, seaweed, feathers and bones....
Or just make a beach goddess out of seashells and stones
We'll put a real magic wand in her hand
Then lie down and howl and dance in the sand
In a ritual of healing and hope and love
while we imagine faces in the clouds above..
There's so many kinds of neat things to do
In the play of the moment love can come thru.
A bazillion ways to heal a stuck heart.
Come on, come one, LET's create a new START!
HESTIA'S INVITATION 2003
(For Sheryl from Hestia and Marcia)
I Am Hestia, Goddess of home and hearth,
Mistress of Sacred Space.
Alive and here with you.
Perhaps in the bustle of activity,c
racing with time
You didn't notice me:
But I was there, round and about
in the fresh air,
the gentle breeze entering a window opened for me,
or a softness in the room where a spot of sun
lit the fresh fluffed chair.
Find me in the drape of wild flowers in a spring vase,
spiraled tendrils welcoming you Home.
Perhaps your own eyes, fastened on tasks at hand
missed the clear scent of sage
blessing your arrival,
Yet I was there as the Stillness in the center of the house,
Peace at the end of an old broom
sweeping cobwebbed corners
where neglect or sorrow lingered.
Perhaps in the noise of anxious thoughts my song for you
went unheard,
Humming subtle lullabyes from the garden,
or while mopping the kitchen floor for morning barefoot
dances;
Yet sing I did, beckoning you in Silence
To Be peaceful here,
To rest in this refuge ordinary no more
as I wash a window clear,
and de-fingerprint the front screen door.
Oh, do you sense my Presence now,
As I clear a space at the table for Love to abide?
Clean the small rug at the entry of the house?
My name is Hestia, Goddess of loving Quietude,
Tender of Sacred Space.
Welcome Home, sweet one.
MOTHER'S DAY
In Memory of Elaine, Celia, Bella, and Zelda "Sam"
5-8-05
I rest in the body of Gaia,
Surrounded, filled, contained
in Her loving protection.
I am sated at Her breast,
For Her ancient roots run deep,
And Her milk is flowing.
I blossom under Her tutelage,
Learning to ride
The play of the moment.
I ripen juicy with Her grace,
Am consumed by the world in Beauty,
Becoming Light.
CHILD OF WIND
2005
Child of Wind,
Can be had for a breeze,
A rustle, a whisper
caught in the trees,
Airy fair kisses caressing her cheek,
Or a gusty invite to play hide and seek,
Here, then gone, then found sneaking a peek...
Child of Wind,
Seasoned to flights,
Bird girl lifting
to airy winged heights,
Borne on the currents of spirited rides,
On the back of the wind, both ancient and wise,
This child-woman soars to where joy resides,
With Love in her hair, Wind Child abides.
WHAT IF
June 17 2004
What if
There were nowhere better -or even possible - to be ?
Your purpose in life was simply to love and be loved, to know you are love-able, without having to have proof of worthiness?
Your destiny included both the blueprint for, and the means to fulfill your life?
The Way to Happiness lay in choosing to make others happier while being and doing what makes you happiest?
What if
Home is wherever you are when you are happy, and happy is what you are whenever your heart is open enough?
Family are those around you when you are feeling love-able?
The ultimate determination of what is "right" or "wrong" was considered God's Domain, and you and I just went about being and doing Love's happy-bringing works?
What if
The source of all our pain or suffering was simply forgetting temporarily how to just Be - Happy? Loving?
What a wonderfully happier world it would be.
DANCING IN THE COSMIC BARRIO
An Ode to Creative Spirit on Mother's Day 2003
Drafted into an army of cars and trucks,
At war with L.A. Traffic, again,
I dance -driver's seat style, behind the wheel,
90.7 FM -The Cosmic Barrio laying world beat music at my feet,
Rhythms streaming from my radio to God's Ears,
Pirouetting tears down my face
Mother's Day
motherless child
means to dance her life back in,
"Dance the cooties away" -didn't I say to my roommate
as I left to drive to dance class?
Sworn in now to my battalion of SUVs
Marching in regimented lines, all around surrounding me
As I pull a scream of Overwhelm
into transforming dancer's hands,
one pressed against the steering wheel
while the other,
fingers spread, fans out pleas
to the rhythms of sitar music,
Moan becoming Wail as faceless soldier motorists
in front, behind, beside me
inch along to Final Destinations.
I dance my heated Mother's Day prayers,
nearly anonymous child of a perplexing urban universe,
"Dance with me!" my heart begs, cajoles, dares to offer,
"See me, see through me, my longings, my Light,"
she ropes and sways as a billboard comes in sight:
"City of Hope," he proclaims, reaching out to us
shimmying behind the wheel of my hope-filling
automobile
Freehand flaring into mudras known only to traffic dancers
in the megalopolisian Cosmic Barrio
on Mother's Day, Hope Day,
my creative Spirit Rising
to the Occasion of my Life.
PEACE PRAYER
Fall 2006
Guide me to be an Instrument of Thy Peace.
To find strength through adversity,
the strength and passion to reach
for the Love Promised
within the Heart of conflict,
Love that awaits me there with open arms.
Strengthen my resolve, my faith in Love
that I may risk loving actions
in the face of great pain
And vengeance.
Teach me how to see, hear and speak
the language of LovingKindness
in the midst of chaos,
Even as the ravages of fear, hatred and suffering
threaten to lay waste to my life
and the lives of those I love.
Inspire me with clarity and boldness,
No matter what darkness seems to prevent the light:
To tell the Truth:
that the divine balm of Loving is nigh,
A Breath away,
That the Power of Love
is just a Breath away.
Make me an Instrument of Thy peace
that I may know its sweetness,
Bestow its gifts on others,
and be gifted in return.
Blessed Be. And so it is.
Aho. Namaste. Amen.
(Reprinted from Awareness Mag, Winter 2001)
76 EMAILS
(sung to the tune of "76 Trombones..."
76 Emails when I checked tonight,
73 were spam, don'cha know.
Sexual, financial, assorted sorts of crap
Designed to try and pry me from my dough....
76 Emails appearing on my screen,
Only 3 from people that I know:
One says, "Hi," another forwards me a joke,
And the 3rd hopes I'll come and see his show.
76 Emails to delete tonight,
In-boxed 'n stored ones -then I'm done.
I'd be tired and cranky, but golly, what the heck,
Making up this verse was so much fun...
That tomorrow night I might beneath the gun
Write another or just send you a re-run?!
(If I repeat will you delete or simply shun?)
(OOPS: Is ham-ming same as spam-ming once begun?!)
THE LOVE GODDESS IN EVERYWOMAN
2000
There's a Love goddess in You,
in me,
in EveryWoman.
Shine deLight on Her
and experience Being
the Beauty-Full Woman that you Are,
that I Am,
That is EveryWoman in her natural
Nature-All state. And radiate!
Love, sexy love,
electric and magnetic love nature.
Enjoy sensual pleasure
the pleasure of all your senses
your sense-you-all-ity- coming alive.
Nurture your self with your coming aliveness,
with your Be-Coming
Aware
of your True nature,
the nature of whole awareness,
Wholesome you, me, we are,
Naked to deLight of full-bodied aliveness,
Freely expressing love,
mindful of the moment,
making love with the moment,
Trusting
the PLAY of a Moment,
the Divine Play of the Love Goddess
in you,
in me,
In EveryWoman.
9-1-1 (Nine- One -One)
Shove open wide the window,
Hurl profanities at the neighbor's stupid barking mutt,
caustic epithets backing up into hot tears,
exhausting hopes for peace or quiet... 9-1-1...
Ohgod! Saucepan, stove, eggs hard- boiling
forgotten in a blur of self pity,
scrambled hormones scurrying for safe haven
finding only sulphured fumes,
air lit with familiar stench...9-1-1...
With scouring fury, attack blackened enemy pot
Can not scrub away residues of conscience, though
caked onto my hammered mind:
"Do Something Do Something Do Something!
-A psyche, a neighborhood, a nation, a world
is Suffering A Heinous Loss of Innocence...9-1-1..."
Confusion stares back from my bottomless saucepan,
Too upset to be a hero.
Pick up the phone, dial 9-1-1 for emergency relief.
Pray Goddess answers.
AT THE GETTY?!
Musings on an Intolerant Petty Offender
Fall 2001
Went to the Getty Center
to listen to Poetry read by pros
Alone faced the fast L.A. freeways
Blaring lights against a black cool fall naked nightsky.
Pulled into the cavernous parking lot
handed a flyer warning of new security measures
9-1-1s
Ride the silent tram, elevator rise, steps, alone with three
other women
stopped politely by four marked men
Suited up to inspect our bags,
My knit one opened by drawstrings to reveal suspicious
kleenex,
Coin purse,
Keys ordered out naked onto the table.
All four sets, we four women, exposed, lay there
as brightbeamed lights flashed to the bottom of our
purses
Passing inspection, thanked, four walk solemnly to the
auditorium, a little numb, innocence lost, freedoms no
longer reliable,
sobered sadness in our hearts.
One turns to me in disbelief, says, "At the Getty?!"
SOFTPLAY ME
For B.B. from M.S. 1987
SoftPlay Me
Tickleteasing hairs alive along my arm
Eyesparkle mischiefmaker,
planting wee kisses on my shouldertop
mark a secret spot all your own, then
Dart to a forgotten big toe
Jumpstarting me into appeals of laughter,
Struggles to win back my foot
in a tangled wrestling of hips, thighs
legs and tongues, I come undone.
Invent me all over again,
Cover me in warm breaths and surprise shivers
cascades along my spine, propelled
by divine choruses of unseemly noises,
feather kisses stunning me weak with delights,
Each cell anticipating, elating, all things New
Exposing me alive to each Moment shared
All things Dared,
No Love spared
Softplay me.
THE PERFECT CATCH
(For Marv) 10-6-05
Our hearts newly opening, outpoured our hopes and dreams,
You read a poem to me
Laying out a scheme
that only two sweet lovers,
balanced in every way,
could know twixt one another,
What more was left to say...?
How wondrously seducing
Is the lingo deep construed,
That tells of tender longings
Transformed to Faith Renewed
as needs are co-responded,
fulfillments gently laid
upon a dear, soulmated table,
With loving-kindness, service made?
So you and I met, hoping,
To see in each other's eyes
Some Truth of Lovers' Destinies
There clear epitomitomized...
Yet whom I met was human,
This mirror seeking me,
perfectly imperfectly
questioning, "What's to be?"
Beauty-ful-fill-mentings
Adorned our hearts' ideals,
'Midst sobering revealings
That spun our dreaming wheels
causing tiny Disappointments,
and cause to pause and doubt:
"Can this be MY true love, then,
If THIS is what s/he's about?!"
Alas for lofty dreamers, then,
Who, if lacking spunk and pluck,
Cave, when reality comes calling,
Disguised as lack of luck
-or incompatibility,
or simply, "not my type"
which may be true, or maybe not
or maybe just a hype?
Perhaps for lasting soulmates
Of the real and truly kind,
There's a chemistry of willingness
To court the Unknown, blind
To any Doubt that Love alone
Always leads the way.
That Love alone's appearing
In the Guise of what's in play...
So my Ideal is shifting,
From the way he talks and dresses,
To discover Love and Spirit
Behind all that he expresses.
And while that may not alone
Bring the 'mate' my heart desires,
I figure that in practicing,
The joy that that inspires
relieves my heart of how it's strained
behind old walls of doubt;
And makes me more desireable
A mirror to have about.
I wish you love, I wish you well,
I envision you In Love;
Dwelling in that place of Heart
We're fond of speaking of:
Dwelling in that place of Heart
Where all there is , is Love.
THE LOVE EXPRESS
April 2001
How Do I Express Love?
By daring to come out
By daring you to come out, too
to play -be wild, alive, organic, creative
To be fluid, flexible and strong.
HOW?
By daring to tell my story -our story,
To find and expose mySelf
-Be mySelf, my true, real, same as you
-Different than you
crazy-with-longing to be wholly free
ME -wheeeee Self.
HOW?
By creating Beauty
By seeing Beauty
all around me, and within me
-in you too!
To see with untainted eyes
Hear with an unadulterated heart
Feel, embrace with a kind touch
Wear a body full, fat with love
to give, to spill over into a world so badly in need
HOW?
By breathing
Being
Living
Dying
By virtue of the fact that Creator made me..
I Am -Am I not
Love ItSelf
HerSelf , HimSelf, joined.
I Am
You Are
We Are
Ever
Love Expressing.
BEHOLD, A FANTASY GODDESS
1999
I'll dance for you tonight,
in the dark ghost of my imagination
I, Goddess of Delights
Resurrecting from past burials in this very room,
now dance naked in a moonbeam spotlight
to the music of our dual heartbeats
Drumming, beckoning me to the center of the room.
You'll sit here on the bed, watching,
Entranced while I whirl, twirl a silvery web of delicious intrigue,
My long Temptress arms
tracing spidery patterns
into sandlewoodsy scented air,
Spouting finger waves alive and moving with determination
Narrate my rocking hips, moving to silent moon music,
Saliciously teasing themselves into hot undulations
Thrusting my pelvic seas towards you my love,
Urging you to join me,
I dance and dance, parting sinewy legs
now revealing fertile Sheila Na-Gig vulva lips dark reddish
full with heated longings,
Wet desire wild lullabyes singing of love and untamed desires
No longer hiding, my dance grows stronger, more certain,
Exciting, uniting us, me and you, my dear,
Two creatures of full mooned exposures
Hands on my breasts wet with sweaty promises
nipples taut, my Heart bursting open -
Yes!
But just as swiftly as this Aphroditean Vision arises
It falls away, exposing the shameful truth of my impotence.
I drop hints of undying devotion
at your feet,
and watch them lie there unnoticed
in silly little heaps of romantic, schoolgirl
embarrassments.
TIM HAS CANCER
1/18/99
He walks with Death as his advisor
with sober, calm resolve.
His choosing is lean now, cuts to the bone.
Though fearful winds wail around him
and his life presents itself
in a myriad pieces come apart,
his Center is undisturbed
For the I in the hurricane sees
his undying, irrefutable Spirit
and rests in the ocean of his undeniable Being.
He steps forward in Balance and Beauty,
prepares to die into his Soul,
and Be reborn again
and again.
Radical Severance, Radical Trust
Bones lay scattered
dust to dust.
Ashes, ashes, all fall down,
Wings awaiting
truthful ground:
Flight assured
when Self is found.
THE MASSAGE
5/29/96
Cool silk,
Outdoors,
an evening breeze teases us.
I fingertip across your skin,
Tracing breezy pathways along your thigh
dancing high
along a leggy you.
Drops of anointing oil I pour
into the cup of my palm,
calm rose and mint scents
Borne on a small gust of windspin,
spirited, wrapping 'round us.
These hands are working their magic,
Love magic, Beloved,
Gentling you right into the lap of the Goddess,
Stroking your hair, soothing away care
-dare to caress you all over.
Slow, slow, such an oh- slow delicate tease
Sees
the marks of strain, pain of the world
written on your face and brow.
Somehow
We'll erase all that.
My hands move slow,
go down so deep, way inside where you lie
awaiting me to bring you back into Life.
Gliding, sliding, oil, rose petal scented healing,
rubbing away remembrances of past hurts.
We move together,
Two, a silent duet,
Your body, my hands
making Love.