SOMETHING FOR THE FALL
All I Want
“All I want is for you
to be happy, dollink!”
Right! Them’s hostage-taking
words whenever I hear them
(with or without the ‘dollink’)
because I know from
the experience of a lifetime
that whoever says them
has an agenda as long as
the Book of Deuteronomy.
It is the most devastating
bribe any man or woman
can solicit, because
it laughs at any answer
that can be given at the time,
for the next minute it will change
to something different.
Philosophers of Ordinary
Language, any one of them,
can say it better than I,
who am no longer
a philosopher of any kind:
just a man on a journey
traveling alone or at times
with others who have come
to understand how wishes
and desires are far too
fugitive to be trusted.
© September 9, 2011 Sheppard B. Kominars
My job is to make sure the Spirit can move Spirit is shy, like a lover embarrassed by the imperfections of his body. Spirit is fearful that its energy may be abused or taken for granted, or worse, invited in and then ignored, like the gentle grandfather silenced as youth professes respect for him. Spirit is fickle, blowing west then east, depending on the power and number of its callers. The trick is to make sure that there is space, welcoming space that will respectfully envelop it, without snuffing it out or demanding too much. If the space I've created is too open, lacking a feeling of nurturance or safety, I might find myself alone, host to a party without a guest of honor, making plans for the leftover punch. If the space I've created is too tight, the crowd may leave the spirit feeling unwanted and wary of having to compete for attention like a 5 year old a cocktail party. If the space I've created is too quiet, the spirit may pass it by, distracted by the shiny jangle created by the workings of another group, another facilitator of the spirit greater than myself, a living Bodisatva with skills I can't even imagine. If the space I've created is too bright, I may expose all of the spirit's blemishes, my expectations expanding as it passes under the magnifying glass of our collective gaze. Who knows? Maybe I'm fooling myself. Maybe I don't have a clue what spirit is or how it moves. But I have to try. That's my job. >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> --
BodySoul Care Program Coordinator
Faithful Fools Street Ministry
234 Hyde Street
San Francisco, CA 94102
DEVON
Devon, my sister’s grandson, is an expert at slithering and sliding and crawling; but now he exceeds his powers of movement by pulling himself up on a piece of furniture and getting ready to stride like the man he is becoming.
Meanwhile he flows and billows in a flood dance along the carpet. From this position he will excite the attention of his relatives by directing his efforts into those of a well-developed child that can hop, skip and jump into his perception and that of those who congregate around him into a lifetime of continual growth and promise.
Marsha Campbell November 3, 2011
From Beneath The Wreckage
Today I feel ready to get rid of the wreckage
To blow gigantic holes in the story
I’ve been telling myself my entire life
I want to destroy my old thoughts and beliefs
They are dear to me, they keep me safe
I could just hold back in life and be a “floater”
Why do I need to be a star and shine? My ego wants this so badly.
I want to flush my ego down the toilet
I want to detach
You should detach Ronnie…you’re holding back
The truth is that there is no power in your old beliefs
Who do you think holds power over you? Who chooses what you think?
You do. It’s all freedom. A freedom that you’re still scared to let go of completely and just revel in. It’s in the struggle that you must be patient with.
It took a long time to form the beliefs that your dream COULDN”T come true.
NOW, it will take some time and healing for the opposite to be
Cultivated and nurtured as a new state of mind.
If you are scared, don’t be, just take my hand and we’ll figure this out together
Have faith that your true destiny will unfold and the God’s master purpose will be revealed to you……slowly like a sunset with a slight breeze, and dolphins gently swimming in waves. The waves rippling in peacefully. Now there are no worries, no fears, only love, courage will move us to our new day. The truth is Ronnie, you will not die a failure, as you and I grow up, we become one and we’ll be strong like an ancient radiant, Cypress tree.
Ron Corral
Is It Sanity
Is It Sanity?
Is it sanity that asks me to
leave the comfort of my cave
in which I have layered all
my fears and inadequacies
to venture on a mission
of mercy to the tottering
pilgrim I’ve met on the road?
What can I put in his beggar’s
bowl? What can I warm
his frozen fingers with?
Who am I to try to comfort him?
Such thorn-shot questions
pierce me by their thrust.
This is not an exercise at all;
this is the lurching-along-the-path
beneath my own feet, beneath my
own breathing out and in. This is
the confrontation with my own
reflection in the sacred mirror
of life. Yes, what I can offer him
is this witness and this poem,
for that is what he is looking for.
© September 9, 2011 Sheppard B. Kominars
Life Without Constraints
I would be free…I am free, like the raven I have wings
I seek to regain the muscle memory of my youth to use them once again
To rise above fear and know there is no power, just stagnation.
To open my heart, is the journey I seek
To risk it all…to know that I live to the call of my own truth
To know that happiness is now….not something to obtain
I intend…I dream…I co-create my reality into real possibilities
That ring to the truth of who I am….Who I am supposed to be
No longer matters. I am just me now….this takes away all the unnecessary
Pressures I once placed on myself. They float away to nothing.
Constraints are illusions
It’s a shift in consciousness that now informs me of the truth.
Yet it is still unsettling at times….that my mind and thoughts transform and inform
My intentions into reality.
I step forward, albeit shakily sometimes times…into the great wide open
The world becomes my own private Idaho….vast beyond comprehension.
So minute that I can miss smelling the roses versus the grand vistas that make up my life
To observe both, the macro and the micro
Is not always an option
I realize that life has a path….and choice will be made.
May my gut intuition and faith in the universe serve me as guides in my life travels.
Blessed Be!!
Ron Corral
Where I Belong
Gliding on the cool glassy waters
Under the view of Mt. Tam to the South East
I finally realize…this is my home…this is where…I belong
God has put me here and has giving me peace
I paddle upstream as the high tide begins to fall
I glide under a bridge, two boys run up to its edge
And say: “HEY, I want to do THAT!!!!”
I slip on by them on my airplane wing like surfboard
Thoroughly digesting and enjoying each stroke of the paddle
Through the water.
I float past green reeds, old wooden boat docks
and the muddy banks of Galllinas Creek
This, here….is my new playground!
I am grateful as I think of the Miwok people who once
Occupied this land and how it was once used so resourcefully
I begin to slip into a day dream as a paddle, I imagine the island culture
Of Hawaii where this fine idea of floating on a big plank of wood with a paddle
(once used as a way to fish in the sea)
has come today to me, to bring a new peace
of mind and contentment.
I feel so connected with the flow of time and space out here
in nature on my paddle board.
A dragon fly buzzes low, its reflection rippling on the water……
it glances in curiosity at me…..And me at it…
we flow now one in the same,
I glide…..and the dragon flies.
Ron Corral
The space between my tears
The space between my tears widens right now.
My expressions of lost images come out in my tears.
I welcome these.
Tears flow down my eyes, down my cheeks, and drip off my chin.
I do not wipe them away for they have a purpose.
They are allowed now.
This space is wider.
I am more accepting and gentle, some days.
Healing rivers of tears I share with others that I hid so well, too well.
These may tears wash away the many masks I have created to protect me.
No more.
No more!
Wash away please.
Cleanse me now.
Tears of rage come into the light and melt away.
Tears of loneliness create an electric waterfall within my heart.
Tears of loss, like old ghosts, disappear in the mist to haunt me less and less.
Tears of joy I let in like the morning air.
Tears create space.
Space gives me room to move in ways I had never imagined.
Instead of a statue, I have become clay.
Come play with me.
I laugh at myself now.
I do not care what you think anymore.
I am allowed to be messy, sloppy, loud, ugly, weird, crooked, late, tired, happy, excited; me!
Space allows me to discover me.
Thank you tears for providing this vital, expanding, purple space.
Wider now.
Expansive.
Calm.
Relaxed.
Serene.
Smiling without a mask to hide behind.
Stopping to feel the healing sun rays.
Not caring what or how I may appear.
Wet.
Torn.
Broken.
In pieces.
I am the space between my tears.
Jenine Quinones 22011
Dancing feels so good, especially when I get the moves and the timing. I felt a bit lost when I joined the Zumba class at the gym. Now I can mimic most of the moves. I learn more of the sequences in each class. And the teacher even told me she sees improvement in my dancing.
This could be used as a metaphor for life: When we try something new, we might wobble and not know how to do all of it. We might not move like the advanced folks do. We may get tired or confused before we get through a whole sequence of linked actions. The truth is… I am really doing a lot of self-directed activity that I never did before and I hope to keep it all in a dynamic balance. My mind is on, my body is alive, I can affect changes, albeit little, in my sphere of influence. I helped a non-chore-doer roommate set up to do his chore and I stopped before I actually did the chore for him. I praised him afterwards. He went from a “never” to a “sometimes” and I did not break a sweat over his chore.
Little changes: milk instead of soda, fruit instead of candy, go to sleep before midnight so I can get up before noon, send thank you cards or say thank you to key good-doers in my life.
Less negative drama leaves more time for contemplation and doing useful, positive tasks.
January 28, 2011
Zak B.
Peeps
By
Ed Bowers
There was once upon a time
A wizened wizard in an ancient child’s body
Sitting in front of me staring in shock and disbelief
At something I had seen yesterday,
And that he had seen too.
So he was scared!
See, I walk and sometimes I see things that are there.
The things are there when I see them so I see them. Simple.
Yesterday on 11th street I saw a tall building made of
Granite egg cartons and wondered what was inside.
Wondering about insides could get you killed.
There are secrets, you know.
So I’m old and I don’t care and walk into the building
Because I guess the janitor is an alcoholic who drinks in the
Parking lot next to it and leaves doors unlocked.
I saw the janitor. I know.
Inside the building I observed that its insides
Were hallowed out. There were no floors, offices, condominiums.
There was only building and building and building
Rising to the Sun.
So I didn’t go up and down or around the building and
Only saw what was inside which was a
GIANT MOTHER HEN BIGGER THAN KING KONG AND
GODZILLA PUT TOGETHER! WOW!
The mother hen was fifteen stories high.
Plus, inside the building there was enough space to surround her with
TINY YELLOW CUTE GIANT CHICKS
Like peeps in a sixteen story cement Easter basket and the
Chicks and the Mother Hen were pecking their way out of the building
And soon they would escape from where somebody wanted them to exist
And exist where nobody wanted them to be.
That’s why the wizard is in shock. He loves people but he knows:
The giant chickens love people too.
Love is a big word
And can be used in many little ways.
If you love to eat you know what I mean.
Love is not destined to mean the same to everyone.
And chickens love to eat.
And when the big chickens get out of the big building
People will finally understand what happens
WHEN THE CHICKENS COME HOME TO ROOST!
This is the way it is going to be.
‘Be’ is just two letters with a period. But the period is big and important.
When the chickens get out of the building
They will be so happy at what they see that their ecstasy
Will almost cause them to be able to fly.
Worms everywhere they will see!
Worms walking on sidewalks, worms in wheelchairs,
Worms in strollers and cardboard boxes and
Worms in condominiums and
Worms riding inside fast vehicles.
Etc. worms everywhere, all there,
Ready for the chickens to eat without having to work
At digging them up or worrying about them
Running away. There is nowhere to run when it comes to chickens.
The chickens will eat the worms with a giant
YUM! YUM! YUM! Pecking and pecking and pecking.
And the chickens will inherit the Earth.
Who would have thought it?
The wizard and I understand.
The chickens have bonded with us because
We saw them first.
They will follow us around and wherever we go
They will eat.
Sometimes they will try to feed us a worm.
The wizard isn’t happy about this
But my jury is still out.
So if you’re listening to me now
You probably aren’t there anymore.
You’re inside a chicken.
My apologies.
This wasn’t my idea.
But I guess this is just another ‘is’
That has to ‘be’.
It would make a great fifties horror movie
If it wasn’t real.
I wonder what’s next.
“There’s always something,” they say
“Life goes on,” they say.
I learned love folding laundry - by turning Benny's t-shirts right side out, by matching Danny's socks, by using bleach and separating out the whites, by not putting into hot what might shrink, by using stain remover on Shelley's black knit tops, by folding Tia's jeans just right or making sure that Emme's favorites didn't end up wrinkled with lint.
The bags of laundry were heavy. We had to drive into Fairfax from Woodacre, usually evening, after dinner, not that often, maybe just a couple times a month - Shelley was a thrift store shopper meaning buying something new for tomorrow is easier and more fun than going to the laundromat - Benny hadn't yet added on a laundry room and bathroom spa to the house he and his dad built.
Sometimes I'd take small batches home to do when I'd be by myself. I would load the machine inspecting every piece wondering if I needed to turn it inside out, if it would really matter - each sock, all those soft cotton tee's, each sweat pant leg and jeans galore, one after the other had my attention. . Folding so carefully took my mind to filling my time with loving and it wasn't just 1 person, it was 5 - Shelley, Benny. Tia, Danny, and Emily whose presence made me want to wake up each morning and be alive to live out all the different parts of every day in her service. I was her god-mom. She was my god-daughter. Shelley my best friend, Benny so safe to love, beloved Tia, my hero and Danny dear, so like me. I was never happier.
Meg Margolis August 2010
Mercury
The small tooth
(his first) falls
from his fist
to sigh beneath
the dark wet
lashes of his sleep.
In the deep blue shadows
of his pillow
the young child dreams:
Bright orbits
of imagination, bone and light
He wakes
to find
a silver Mercury dime
and some part of him
spirited away
in the night.
Venus
Blue Lady sings a song
sorrowful as Palestine
sweet chariot fall.
You are a meteorite
slanting through the Pines.
Your touch both
intimate and cold
at once
the brush of a cotton sheet
falling from
a body asleep.
You are the pale
light of morning.
You are mist.
Earth
At noon the cedars are an electric green
the limestone bluffs a pale yellow
the water is dark
and sparkles like mica
fish breathe.
Mars
Mujeres. Indians. Faggots. Whores. Young black men.
Vets. Baby girls in Asia. The Children of Abraham.
Africans. The mentally retarded. The people of East
Timor. The poor. The poor. The poor.
Prozac Love
Nothing surprising jumps out of my hands.
They have been wrung of chaos
and a passion for emphasis.
They look waxy and are dumb
as unlit candles
They won’t hold a pen or a fist.
But the floors are well swept
and the books are arranged
according to size.
Nothing surprising jumps
out of my shelves.
We go to movies a lot
to escape the humid afternoons.
Outside
the day is colored
like a ‘70’s game show.
Why are we talking
about Las Vegas, again, again?
Everything
looks faraway
as if seen
through toy binoculars
held backwards.
All the doors
are purple or yellow.
They open and shut
wagging their tongues
like telephones.
Now the windows
fly away.
At the end of the block
(which is a great distance.)
a little man dressed in black
waves a Stetson and shouts
“Faster, faster. They’ll get away.”
Then disappears
around the corner.
I shuffled forward
as fast as I can.
I want to run.
But, I’m afraid to lose a shoe.
Let go of my hand, please.
Don’t you hear the accordion music?.
Please, let go of my hand.
My chest feels like
soggy cardboard.
I can poke my finger
through my heart
without finding its center.
Poems bleed
on my tongue unspoken
Let go. Let go. Who are you?
All this Talk about the End of the World
All this talk about the end of the world
the Mayan Calendar, Nostradamus,
nuclear winter, global warming.
One despairs at our willingness
to give up on our existence.
Admittedly, I do worry
upon reading
that we are fighting
farmers, fish and Native People
for clean water.
But, I’m still not ready to give up on the planet.
People speak of omens
and strange things happening
everyone has
their favorite dooms-day scenario.
They argue and wave it about
like an ideologue
at a political rally.
That’s what
a lot of this is about.
We all want
to be a part of
something larger
to sustain us
until we reach
the final credits
rolling on the screen
Everybody wants a happy ending,
to be among the survivors
in the golden sunset
at the movie’s end.
We all want to go riding shotgun
with the Hollywood cast
as they head back
to southern Cal.
We all want to relax
to look to heaven
and hum the theme song
from the Poseidon Adventure.
No one wants to hear that
their final scene was in the first act.
That their lines were cut.
They don’t want to be
the black character in a slasher pic.
But, not everyone makes it to the final act.
All this talk about the end of the world.
People interpreting signs and omens.
Giving the finger
to scientific fact.
When did we decide
that science was just
another superstition?
That prophecy
was entertainment?
When did we agree
that we have no obligation
to the future?
Yes, our time is limited.
But the sun will dance
and the earth will spin
long after we have given in.
Upon awakening
in the morning blue
it’s not Gabriel’s trumpet
I listen for
what I strain
to understand
are the strange mutterings
of my heart
speaking to
the gathering light
and wondering
of a response.
Jesse James Johnson 2011
“To the womenfolk I am about to meet.”
To know me and for you to know you, then we can skip the getting-to-know-you period and begin to interact. Once said, “The first rule in any relationship is, I can’t read your mind.” This is always true to a great extent. If you want connection or you want solution, you make a request or an immutable demand, or even if you need a break before what comes next on the schedule today, then pray tell do tell. If you cannot say it, grab a pen and a pad. Doodle up a sign and show that around.
My heart responds to what my senses acquire. Sense beauty, then beauty received. If a statue of cold, rigid marble, then I grasp my own hands behind my back and treat you like a museum piece to be observed and left unaltered.
The heart feeds on the meeting of the minds and if you cannot explain to me how to work your control panel then I am not buying your Wild Berry Candies from A9 or B6. I call out to you the way I do. If you shrink from my voice, what did it touch in you? I am not a hot stove or salt in the garden. I see you as I do and I greet you like any good thirteen-year-old with a large vocabulary would: with words and mostly words that manifest pictures that I feel will move you, change you as they changed me when I evolved them. Time is fleeting and even Rapunzel had her hair pulled after years of loneliness before she got her prince. Love is the how as we awake in the morning, we make peace with the empty impression in the bed beside us that is still warm to the touch.
Zak B me.
November 4th 2011
Sept 9/22/11
Alone among the trees?
Right.
Anybody who thinks she can be alone
among the trees or anywhere
is kidding herself
lulled into the delusion that any of us can be autonomous
in creation.
I am who I am because my parents lost a baby before me,
a baby that would have been a girl.
I am who I am because they didn't get that divorce,
the divorce that almost happened while I was inside my mother,
young, scared,
missing her father
and her grandmother.
But that near-divorce,
the trauma to my unborn body,
my psyche and nervous system in formation,
stays with me,
and though I never knew that baby,
and only remember my great grandmother as a shriveled, blind, and near-deaf old woman,
they are part of me
more than any tree.
That's why I know I can't be alone in the forest.
Rosanna,
Leopold,
Ghislaine,
and that unborn baby girl
are all with me.
Within me.
Fuck Mary Oliver and her fetish for trees and dirt and flowers.
for once I would like to read one of her poems be about something real.
Like sitting in a room, in a building,
a tiny apartment
with a tiny fridge and and a tiny microwave
a computer her only connection to the world outside,
as all of her clothes hang in the substandard 20-inch square closet,
or thrown on the floor in a big,
methane-producing pile for all I care.
Alone,
pretending she's self made,
her own creator, yet surrounded by people in that building,
the modern tenement the property manager calls mini lofts,
sold to hipsters as the ultimate urban experience.
They sit alone with their iMacs, iPhones, and iPads,
connecting to iPeople around the world,
over a complex but invisible web of separation
desperate to connect to anyone,
as long as it isn't the the old man dying in the next apartment,
the man who may need help
changing his shitty diaper
or heating a cup of ramen
in his shitty little microwave.
But that would ruin the illusion,
all that reality,
reaching through the walls
instead of standing among the trees.
--
Rev. Denis Letourneau PaulBodySoul Care Program Coordinator
Faithful Fools Street Ministry
234 Hyde Street
San Francisco, CA 94102
I Wondered As I Heard the Grand Old Man
I wondered as I heard
the “grand old man”
talk about himself and life,
though it was clear
he was certainly old,
just now how grand
he really was.
It’s a sort of noble swell
I get inside
whenever I stand close
to weathered white,
but right now I feel a bit afraid,
a bit embarrassed
at the labored smile
that threatens teeth.
Oh yes, some might say
it’s disrespect
to turn away,
but what is there to do
or see or think
when a man is old
and has had his say?
Now, as he speaks,
his voice shuffles
slow and halts
with spasms of conservatism ,
like the cough
of a grim pilgrim
so near the well.
Let me remember you
without this shaking head
and frosted gait,
let me remember you
instead the man
whose poems spring from birches.
© 2011 Sheppard B. Kominars
What I heard you say was
aching besides Reiki culminates
generates facts-similie similarily,
for clarity momentarily paused beneath the canopy mortuary
but fairies fairly stare me to proper populus past poppy novocaine inoculate
my posture into angel dust phosphorus till my features confuse like Platypus
before Antyus rallied citizens to condemn a Socrates—tees,
my trial is denial self-perception hallucinogen interception like moth
to cocoon regression to a kaleidoscope impression.
My antelope nerves concur with bubbling mold to prefer the appetite of words;
doubtful it’s a mouthful but I’d steak my salisbury
I’m out for a good time at the fools clinic besides poetic mystics that share turpentine wishes
within circling schools of fishes uniting the streams of serene passage to the gulf of Atlas’ serenade
what can happen when we create (?) and share the ingredients of the immediate
Zach T poem from faithful fools 7/2/2011
My Journey With Breast Cancer
I am an imperfect flower with a malignant lump in my right breast in the garden of life. I believe in the Great Spirit, the maker of each and every one of us. To the Great Mystery who is perfection in Being, I am a beautiful flower, flowering my scented petals in the winds of life. I am a member of a club that no one wants to join. The Breast Cancer Sisterhood club – wearing our pink ribbons over pink t-shirts with a pink baseball cap to match. Some women with hair, some without! I wear it all proudly like a marching soldier in a pink uniform. All my Cancer Sisters march by my side. I am not alone. We are one even though my journey is similar, but separate from theirs.
I think about the day the bomb was dropped on my former life, September 9, 2011. My life has changed over this month and a half. It will never be the same. It is difficult, but not impossible. I feel as though I am baring my soul and wearing my feelings on my sleeve. I feel so very vulnerable, and am told this is normal by other Breast Cancer Members. What a great and compassionate club we have. What an overwhelming price for admission to the club that nobody wants to join. My empathy stretches beyond the women in my exclusive club to other human beings. I wonder if they can feel me and my compassion as I write. My understanding is there. My heart unfolds with the melody of life's song. This is a solo journey, but traveled in good company.
I do not have the energy to waste on those who detract from, or do not support my healing from Breast Cancer.
My motto is “Get Busy Living, or Get Busy Dying”, and I'm All About Living!
Sacheen Littlefeather 2011
“Coming To Terms With Life”
Those Stanford graduates
got a bugle blast of truth
when Steve Jobs told them
death is a great opportunity
to clear out the old and make
room for the new.
Graduation means moving on;
Death is moving on.
So welcome it on the bench
beside you instead of turning
your back and pretending
it will happen only to other
people – never to you!
The breath that passes
between your lips is precious
even when you do not
know you breathe it!
And the past cannot be restored
without the loss of all the joy
and beauty that has barged in.
Unfurl your banner of exultation
instead of the limp flag of surrender
when the parade is almost over:
Steve knew that’s what survivors do!
[Written Oct. 6, 2011; Revised Oct. 9]
© 2011 Sheppard B. Kominars
You help me, strange man. I try to breathe when you say so. I try to write when you say so. This will help me leave my hurt in a place not known to the rest of the world. At last I shall be free. Faith will out and I will calm down. I will see you all once more and we will all talk and talk and talk and not stop. My pain will fade. I will breathe once more. You will not have gone from me. We will meet once more and more and more. I will calm down. I will it. “Good night, Sweet Prince,” you all. I go on and on. Don’t quit me. Not more.
Marsha Campbell October 13th 2011
Single Syllable Exercise
I feast on your fat mind.
I lose a piece of it when I have to leave you.
At first I love you . Then you leave me.
I trust you at the start and then you leave me.
Do not love me if you plan to leave me.
I cannot breathe. I can’t not breathe.
Breath comes to me full of grim sips
and then I let it fly out of my mouth.
I see nothing. I hear nothing.
From you. You are gone. Then I am gone, too.
I am a saint, Max said. He meant
I would not leave my love for you.
and give it to him or him or him or him.
My life is a hymn to rage.
You just try and leave me. I will
not let you. My feet are in the clouds
and my head is next to God’s.
He will look down on you and say,
“How could you? How could you hurt this girl?”
And this girl will cry at the fact that
through her you and you and you were hurt.
When at last can I sing once more?
I look at my ring made in the form of a clef
and it gives me hope.
I write what I have to write. I think
What I have to think to write.
Marsha Campbell October 13th 2011
“Engraved Invitation”
It’s there, you know,
you just have to find it --
your voice, that is
at least as important as breath,
for it carries on it
your quenchless spirit sparging
your life and resurrecting
you when you have died
among the confusions and
contradictions of other people’s
convictions and certainties.
I know it takes time
to find your voice,
and that’s just the way it is.
I also know that to find it
you must practice giving yourself
permission to make mistakes.
If you don’t know how to do this
just remember what you did
the first time you fell down:
you just got up, for if you hadn’t
you’d still be sitting there.
Of course it takes some courage,
but so does buttering your toast!
If it doesn’t all melt,
you eat the slice anyway.
And know that the more you dare,
the clearer the words speak
the communion you have
come to the banquet table to enjoy.
[Written Oct. 6; Revised Oct. 9, 2011]
© 2011 Sheppard B. Kominars
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