Originally published December 22, 2006

Winter. Late afternoon.
The beach is empty. The air is grey-blue.
The ocean is grey-silver, scattered with foamy white waves.

At the high-tide mark is a long wooden, railed walkway leading to
an old gazebo perched on top of the highest dune.
Inside the gazebo is a picnic table with benches.

Under the table is a pair of small deck shoes.
Between the shoes is an empty styrofoam coffee cup.

The most interesting thing is on the table. An open book.
The pages on the left are flapping lightly with the breeze.
The pages on the right are clipped together by a pen.
They struggle to move with the wind..

On that first page on the right is a single handwritten line.
In the most delicate and precise penmanship. It says...


"I am going home."

from Jean

I'd rather take the
quiet lane than highway speed.
To explore, detour.

+++++

Life's travels vary.
They take you far and away
yet can bring you back.

First published Sunday, March 01, 2009

Witholding words and, thus, myself.
No trust enough to tell all to anyone.
No one anywhere who can coddle and absorb and still
remain the same, loving, after knowing all that is.

Indeed, myself as most do, parse words carefully, even
in our own hearts.

Some words are painted glossy to look better than they are.
Some are weighted so as to never surface, certainly not
in daylight for others, and often not either known in our
own nights.

Sometimes tripping over the shadows (there are always
shadows since nothing true disappears completely), the
bolt of pain in the stubbed toe flashing a memory of self
back to surface. A moment only long enough to frantically
push it back into the basement and slam the door closed again.
Looking behind self, fearful that someone might have noticed,
might have recognized an unadmitted truth.
Then walked away. Ashamed for knowing.

But, no. No one else.
I keep myself alone enough to pick and choose, pick and choose
carefully, what words will be dressed for dinner.
Offered on a gilt-edge platter. Will be only my best at any table shared.
Why do we fluster so about how to know others while we fail
to know ourselves?

Words not spoken may reveal more truth than those brandished
in the open.

Not at all what you would think.
If you saw.
If you knew.

First published by Jean Monday, May 09, 2011

you are not old
who still sees
beauty:
in a smile
older than yours
or a tree that casts
no shade or
a home with peeling paint
or a lone flower in a weedy bed,
in a threadbare quilt of patches,
a day whose only music
is a birdsong or
someone humming
in the kitchen.

First published July 21, 2008

stay with me
as I need you most
more than any other
in the present ever.
allow what is in me
to be
awake and seeing
all I am and have.