Category: acceptance

Broomstick Season

Published on by geriatric pilgrim12 Comments

~

The trees that can have given up their leaves—

the reds and golds you see in magazines,

(though dry and chewed and rotting with black mold)—

standing outlined against the sky: broom sticks

whose branches seem about to sweep the clouds.

~

Hard not to recall those who died this month:

a grandmother, father, mother-in-law,

Thanksgivings when their absence filled our plates.

The Ronald McDonald House Thanksgiving

of turkey, fear, anxiety, and tears,

as my wife and her sons saw my daughter

for what we all knew would be the last time.

~

Well into the November of my life,

I mourn the green and teeming dreams I had,

The gaudy colored leaves of happiness,

chewed by anger and blackened by misdeeds.

Now naked of ambition, strength, shame, guilt,

but rooted in the rocky soil of Grace,

supported by my friends and families,

I raise my bony, brittle arms to sweep

away remorse, and cry in gratitude:

Thank you, thank you, and thank you, for it all.

~ ~

Desert Labyrinth

Published on by geriatric pilgrim7 Comments

**

Entering:

Heel…toe…heel…toe

trying to focus on the boots

that walk this path lined with

tan, gray, white, russet

stones snaking its way

over copper-colored gravel.

Still, the mind twists, bends, curves

with the path going around, back, between

the blue of the sky, labored breathing,

the inhaler back in the room, 

past mistakes, future apprehensions,

prickly pear, barrel, saguaro cactus,

fantasies, “if onlys,”

scrunch of footsteps.

Following the narrow road of stones

toward the center of what looks

like a petrified brain

which is right ahead

and then it’s not,

spiraling further away.

Turning a corner

torso teeters, trips,

boot kicks

a rock into the path.

Voices from the past snicker

Clumsy klutz!

Kicking the rock back into place.

Walking on.

*

The Center:

Finally

three red rocks triangle

a flat altar stone

spilling painted stones, shells,

ribbons, bracelets, a plastic flower,

a wooden plaque that says:

“Too much of anything is bad,

 but too much good whiskey is barely enough,”

left perhaps by someone hoping to leave 

both plaque and whiskey behind.

Sitting on a red rock wondering

Where is my center?

What do I need to leave behind?

Brown rumpled hills dotted with saguaro,

prickly arms lifted as if in praise,

reply with silence

punctuated by

the cooing of a distant dove.

*

Returning:

Heel…toe…heel…toe

trying to focus on the ground beneath the maze,

the silences between 

the ripples of wind, a cardinal’s whistle,

yellow palo verdi blossoms, azure sky,

sunlight on sweaty skin,

overhanging mesquit branch that 

grabs a shirtsleeve like a past sin.

Stumbling again

kicking another stone again

booting the rock back into place again,

breathing to Thich Nhat Hanh

(breathing in, I calm my body,

breathing out, I smile.)

circling, looping, spiraling,

remembering the center—

The soul? Love? Divine Spark?

Face before you were born?—

circling, looping, spiraling.

Gazing over russet, white, brown, tan

stones to the exit

except it’s also the entrance—

accept it’s also the entrance—

to life’s labyrinthian journey.

**

September Interplay

Published on by geriatric pilgrim7 Comments

◊

Through my window, a September slant of sunlight

softened by shadows cast by hemlocks in the hollow

seems a plush carpet inviting me to take off my shoes

and walk barefoot into a golden world.

◊

Summer sun glares, remorselessly highlighting

weeds I failed to pull, dents I’ve put in the car, windows that need washing.

Winter light is weak and pale, helpless against the darkness

always hovering on the horizon, a constant reminder of mortality.

◊

To someone who’s spent his life caroming 

from one extreme to another, a ping-pong ball

sent back and forth by whoever I’m trying to please today,

◊

September says, “Live in the interplay

of light and shadow, 

of cool mornings and warm afternoons, 

of tart cider and sweet corn,

of raucous crows and cooing doves,

of grief and grace.”

◊

Walking the College Campus at 6:30 A.M. on the 80th Anniversary of of the Bombing of Hiroshima

Published on by geriatric pilgrim4 Comments

#

Police sirens fade as I pass through the

memorial gate to an empty quad,

where morning sun reflects off the windows

of old brick buildings, deserted now of

the footsteps and voices, the ambitions,

anxieties, astonishment, fatigue,

confusion, gratitude, egotism,

disappointments, hangovers, and regret

usually throbbing throughout the halls.

Even in the quiet of the morning,

a deeper silence seems to emanate

from these buildings, a collective wisdom—

coalesced and alive—which assures me:

when all is said and done, all shall be well.

The Chapel at Bowdoin College: Painting by Tim Banks

#

Thank God for Another Chance

Published on by geriatric pilgrim15 Comments

~ ~

Thank God for another chance to fold a fitted sheet,

another chance to butcher a banjo tune,

another chance to win at Wordle.

~

Thank God for another chance to make a perfect cup of hot chocolate,

another chance to discover the perfect hot sauce,

another chance to pick the perfect pen.

~

Thank God for another chance to stroll in springtime through a carpet of pink lady slippers,

another chance to walk in autumn through golden bracken and red maple trees,

another chance to snowshoe in winter across a snow-covered pond.

~

Thank God for another chance to slow dance with my wife in front of the fire on a winter night 

to Patsy Cline singing “Sweet Dreams,”

another chance to admire my granddaughter casting a blood worm

into the Androscoggin River on a summer afternoon,

another chance to decorate our Christmas tree with five generations’ worth of 

ornaments. 

~

Thank God for another chance to shed the ten pounds I’ve never been able to lose,

another chance to read “Lord of the Rings” for the umpteenth time,

another chance to write a poem that just might actually be one.

~

Thank God for another chance to keep my mouth shut when I don’t have anything to say,

another chance to learn how to take a compliment without trying to convince you 

I don’t deserve it,

another chance to stop trying to figure out who I think you think I ought to be.

~

Thank God for another chance to say, “I was wrong,”

another chance to say, “I love you,”

another chance to say, “Thank you.”

~ ~

To Friends who Tell me I Need to Lighten Up

Published on by geriatric pilgrim4 Comments
What can I say? I like clouds in my sky.

~ ~

Thank you for your concern 

about my mental health, 

but I’d rather embrace 

my grief and fear

as if they were gassy grandparents 

who keep my school photographs 

on their refrigerator

to show my yearly growth

than banish the old farts 

to the basement 

and have them pound 

the floor under me 

with a broom handle.

~

Don’t get me wrong, friends, 

I do count my blessings, 

I am grateful for health, family, friends.

And I don’t pretend to understand 

what it’s like trying to stay afloat

in the black seas of chronic depression.

But happiness, I’ve discovered, 

can become complacency, 

which can be a stagnant pond 

swarming with blackflies.

~

I find more blessings to count, 

more for which to be grateful, 

after having been broken open 

by the deaths, destruction, decay around me, 

some of which I’ve caused, 

some of which I haven’t deserved, 

and some of which is just life.

~

Without looking at my grief, 

I’m not able to recognize my joy. 

And I don’t mean glancing at loss 

the way I rubberneck 

at an accident on the highway.

I mean reentering the suffering, 

scrutinizing the fears, 

which means talking 

and writing about them.

~

My urge to create begins in loss, 

my gratitude begins in fear, 

my compassion begins in pain, 

and my joy begins in sorrow.

~

All of which, I guess, is to say:

I’d rather be whole than happy.

~ ~

Scotty

Published on by geriatric pilgrim3 Comments
Thnx to Scotty’s daughter, Jeanie, for the photo

~

Served as Tail Twister of the Lions Club.

He liked his scotch and Camel cigarettes.

Cheered our team at high school basketball games.

Oh, and by the way, he was my pastor,

who, when he ascended to the pulpit,

his black cassock haloed by white candles,

showed me that even short men with bald spots

can be—if only for an hour—holy.

~

Sitting above me in his purple chair

he would sometimes just slightly turn his head,

look down at my family sitting in

the right front pew and give us all a wink.

God, I learned from Scotty, looks after us

with a neighborly twinkle in his eye.

~

Gazebo

Published on by geriatric pilgrim6 Comments

~

“We are saved in the end by the things that ignore us.”— Andrew Harvey

~

At the Spiritual Renewal Center in Arizona

I’m not feeling renewed spiritually or otherwise.

Dusty desert wind sears my lungs as I sit in 90° heat,

stuck to a faded plastic chair in a rundown gazebo—

rotting floor…peeling paint… broken railings—

good place, I think, for an octogenarian

with COPD, a weak heart. and arthritic joints.

Just six years ago I walked the nearby desert trails 

for miles past petroglyphs and rattlesnakes,

up rocky canyons and down sandy washes.    

This morning, I reached for my inhaler after 20 minutes 

and turned back feeling old and dilapidated.

Now, I sit in this decaying gazebo awfulizing about my future:

a sudden heart attack that strikes me down

before I can say good-bye to those I’ve loved, 

or a stroke which leaves me paralyzed and drooling 

while others change their lives to look after me,

or worse, dementia, unable even to say thank you for caring.

Which leads me to wonder: Will I be missed when I’m gone?

Certainly not by the flat cumulous clouds 

floating over the hills on the horizon

 or the wind through the prickly pear, cholla, barrel,

organ pipe and ocotillo cactus,

 not to mention the saguaro standing

with arms raised to the heavens,

 and certainly not by the coyotes 

barking from the copper-colored hills behind me, 

or the doves or cardinals or flycatchers or thrashers 

or warblers or wrens or quails,

nor, come to think of it, by the yellow blossoms

from the palo verdi  blowing in the desert wind, gilding

the rotten gazebo floor and my decrepitude 

with the golden certainty of new life. 

~

Pondering Pants

Published on by geriatric pilgrim6 Comments

~

He remembers the corduroys 

that whistled when he ran away 

from his mother and her hairbrush.

~

Then later, dungarees, 

rolled up at the bottom, 

when he wanted to look tough,

and pegged chinos, 

black with a belt in the back, 

when he wanted to look cool.

~

At his local college, 

to let people know he’d worked Out West,

he wore frayed Frisco Jeans 

with a faded circle on the left back pocket

where he stuck his tin of smokeless tobacco.

~

As an English teacher, 

he wore striped bell bottoms, 

along with double-breasted sports coats, 

and paisley ties with matching pocket handkerchiefs, 

his armor against feeling incompetent.

~

To become a writer, 

he decided he must have khakis

because the New Yorker ad 

said Kerouac wore them.

~

He switched to cargo pants

to enhance his image 

of poet, pilgrim, seeker,

setting forth on the Camino de Santiago,

with all those pockets.

~

Until, proud to proclaim

his waist size hadn’t changed

in over forty years,

he made sure his pants

had elastic waist bands

to go around an expanding gut.

~

These days, however, 

he’s discovered sweatpants, 

because they’re comfortable 

and he no longer 

gives a rat’s ass what he looks like.

~

Acceptance

Published on by geriatric pilgrim1 Comment
Arizona Sunrise

**

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change…

*

When it comes, the clouds clear and the sun shines and you see things the way they are—

not perfect, certainly, maybe not even great, but all in all, not bad—

and you stop trying to change things and beating yourself up when you can’t.

*

The accusing voices in your head, the illusions of grandeur, the sirens’ songs of temptation

fade away and you find yourself singing an old Everly Brothers’ tune or a Christmas carol.

*

The gyre grows smaller, the falcon returns to the falconer, things come together,

the center holds, and serenity envelopes the world.

*

Don’t get me wrong, the clouds will return, more storms will come—

mistakes, injuries you’ll inflict (most of them upon yourself),

unrealistic expectations, failures, disappointments, defeats, deaths—

but maybe, next time, you’ll see rain, not Noah’s flood.

**