The Worriers' Guild

Today there is a meeting of the
Worriers' Guild,
and I'll be there.
The problems of Earth are
        to be discussed
        at length
        end to end
        for five days
        end to end
        with 1100 countries represented
        all with an equal voice
        some wearing turbans and smocks
        and all the men will speak
        and the women
        with or without notes
        in 38 languages
        and nine different species of logic.
Outside in the autumn
        the squirrels will be
        chattering and scampering
        directionless throughout the town
        because
they aren't organized yet.

-by Philip F. Deaver, from How Men Pray

Two Giant Fat People

God
And I have become
Like two giant fat people living
In a tiny
Boat

We
Keep bumping into
Each other
and

L
A
U
G
H
I
N
G


-Hafiz translated by Daniel Ladinsky in Love Poems From God: Twelve Sacred Voices from the East and West p. 171

The Vegetables

Today

The vegetables would like to be cut
By someone who is singing God's name

How could Wesmont know
Such top secret information?

Because
Once we were all tomatoes,
Potatoes, onions, or
Zuchini


-Hafiz

The First Snowflake

i awoke early this morning and stared in silence out my window at the snow raining down on the ivy. a snowflake appeared and i set my eyes on her, whipping and twirling, jumping and leaping, knocking on my window, beckoning me to join her dance. i asked her name but i don’t think she heard me as she slid off and joined her friends in their own snow version of red rover turn over i’m flying over...tell me, do you drop down on your knees and ask for meaning in such moments? i lost her in a haze and soon my thoughts turned to the first snowflake ever to fall from a cloud high above and how she must have felt when she dropped, suddenly alone in a world without end. I wonder what drew her to leave the warmth and softness of her pillow, did her friend triple dog dare her, did she and the other snowflakes draw straws, a game of rock, paper, scissors perhaps; or maybe the others, jealous of her shine, pushed her out, tumbling and shaking, a lone glitter in the sky. i prefer to think that it was something else, a grace, a gift of magic in the air that secretly opened, causing her to suddenly slip and slide down the trap door of her cloud, releasing her to the open sky, no longer enclosed by the fuzzy floating fog of her womb. a bright light in flight, she held on tight, unsure at first, nervous, but slowly, finding herself, a nip here, a tuck there, learning to lean into the wind and ride the wave, soon summersalts came and cartwheels too, her pigtails glowing in the breeze, her voice free, singing every song she ever knew, and then quietly, her flight in the night would come to an end, and she would land for the first time on earth – on a sharp blade of grass perhaps, or the crooked branch of an old oak, caressing her as she settled silently into a sad sleep, alone, waiting for the soft voice of her friends to comfort her and share in her shine.