within the hush

Beyond the Pane by Greg Hewett The frescoed cloister is closed. No echo of omniscience escapes to wind or metaphor. A cottage holds three bowls, earthen and chipped, on a table made of planks smoothed by the surf. One holds buttermilk; another, tomatoes pale as moons; the third, eggs the color of sand. On the sill you would place a globe of ivory roses to echo the dolphin skull beyond the pane, and think how sonorous, how bold, this science of solitude.

memories that creep in....

Early Memory
by January Gill O'Neil

I remember picking up a fistful
of sand, smooth crystals, like hourglass sand
and throwing it into the eyes of a boy. Johnny
or Danny or Kevin—he was not important.
I was five and I knew he would cry.

I remember everything about it—
the sandbox in the corner of the room
at Cinderella Day Care; Ms. Lee,
who ran over after the boy wailed for his mother,
her stern look as the words No snack formed on her lips.
My hands with their gritty, half-mooned fingernails
I hid in the pockets of my blue and white dress.
How she found them and uncurled small sandy fists.

There must have been such rage in me, to give such pain
to another person. This afternoon,
I saw a man pull a gold chain off the neck
of a woman as she crossed the street.
She cried out with a sound that bleached me.
I walked on, unable to help,
knowing that fire in childhood
clenched deep in my pockets all the way home.

the slow spins of stars

People travel to wonder at the height of the mountains,

at the huge waves of the seas, at the long course of the rivers,

at the vast compass of the ocean,

at the circular motion of the stars,

and yet they pass by themselves without wondering.

~ St. Augustine

To My Mother

Mom & Dad, November 2009

To My Mother by Christina Rossetti

Today’s your natal day,
Sweet flowers I bring;
Mother, accept, I pray,
My offering.

And may you happy live,
And long us bless;
Receiving as you give
Great happiness.