Here’s what I don’t get:
Adam and Eve lost the Garden
Because they shared a fruit
From the tree of the knowledge
Of good and evil
Right?
I know that’s the way I learned it
More than half century ago
But the words of the story
Are still there to read

Anyway, 
because Adam and Eve lost the Garden
So did all of their descendants
That is, all of us

So here’s what I don’t get:
If Adam and Eve lost the Garden
When they gained the knowledge of good and evil

Why can’t we
Who have lost the knowledge of good and evil
Who believe we can name the unnameable
And teach the unknowable
Why can’t we
At least return to the Garden?

Want the change
Challenges the poet

“Want the change”
Commands the therapist

NO
I screamsnarl
Not now
When I am so content

Yes now
Replies the therapist
You do not aim high enough
You do not strive hard enough
Want more

Yes now
Replies the poet
Do not take the laurel crown
Nor claim the golden throne
Risk the wind

[Inspired by Mary Oliver’s The Buddha’s Last Instruction]

I could paint my life
should I choose
In hues of attempted value
anxious blue hues
Of trying to be a worthy daughter
worried gold hues
Of trying to be a worthy Catholic
psychedelic hues
Of trying to be a worthy protester
tender green hues
Of trying to be a worthy mother
confused gray hues
Of trying to be a worthy wife
blaring red hues
Of trying to be a worthy professional
swallowing black hues
Of trying. Trying. Trying
To be
Divorced
Remarried
Widowed
Alone, alone, alone
again, naturally

The surprising silver hues
Of late true love, forever certainty
That admits no try

(Star Wars pause:
Laughing as I remember Yoda’s injunction:
“Do or do not, there is no try”)

Seventy-five years
to know
  - sometimes -
there exists
    me
    eternal just me
Not ego’s
too persistent 
need to be
Something Of Explicable Value

And then, 
in pure white radiance 
I know myself 
To Be
something of inexplicable value

I LIVE

take away that redundant I
between L and V
and
I am left with a nothingness
in the middle
a zero
0

I L0VE

Gary Snyder shared
How Poetry Comes To Me


Driving the few blocks home
Turning out of the nursing home
Where my mother lives
Waiting at the stoplight
Where the homeless man seeks mercy
Pausing at the Starbucks drive through
Where I seek, if not mercy, at least solace
Stopping at the CBD dispensary
Sharing stories, smiles and compliments
With the young woman working there

Born many years after I first used marijuana
But more knowledgeable than me
About the chemistry of gummies
Although I likely roll a better joint

Driving away
I remember 
How Woody watched me
Bemused
Just last week
As I carefully unrolled a roach
Ate the contents
Ash and all
Then crumbled and scattered the paper remnants
I looked at him and shrugged
“Old habits,” I said
And he smiled
Rocking slowly
In his Amish rocking chair
On our back porch
That he built
Digging it down so that it is half sunken
Putting our eyes on level with growing plants

Making that last turn home
Loving the beautiful home we have made
 From a quite ordinary house
In a quite ordinary neighborhood
Because we are, Woody and I,
Quite ordinary people 
to everyone
Except each other

Coming inside
Past our Japanese maple trees
Each carefully chosen by Woody and me
And planted by Woody
My personal arborist
Walking in the back door
Into the downstairs kitchen
That we designed together
And Woody built for me

I am just in time
To prepare for my poetry workshop

That is how poetry comes to me

I have written in praise 
of warm soapy dishwater
- but never of squat dishwashers

I have written of pleasure
hanging out fresh laundered clothes
- but never of efficient washing machines

I have written about passion
treading with me on forest paths
- but never about superhighways 

I have written of peace 
under a slowly turning ceiling fan
- but never of automated climate control

Ah, I understand

I write of contentments 
of the contemplative life

but 
I live in the comforts
of convenient life

Hobbes
our huge old cat
startled my sister from sleep
jumping onto her chest
twenty years ago this July

My sister slept in our bed
as I stayed with Gordon
my husband of 14 years
in palliative care
as he ended his life with cancer
and I began my life without him

Hobbes, used to sleeping with Gordon
assaulted my unsuspecting sister
in the middle of the night
”Jesus Christ,” she later said
”that’s a mountain lion, not a cat.”

Gordon died later that week
Hobbes lived for 10 more years
dying when he was 23
from wounds sustained in a fight

He was shriveled by then
 mainly lying around
twitching with dreams
and pain
but still treasuring occasional 
backyard jaunts
until he took on that raccoon 
and lost

But, much like Gordon
he died without
ever
giving up on living.

(Twenty years ago, my husband, Gordon, died on July 5. I wrote this soon after and just found it.)

Strangely, my ex-husband
Tried to prepare me
For Gordon’s death

He is a doctor
My ex
An intensive care specialist
Who knows death well

It probably won't be quiet
He said
It might not be peaceful
He said
Even though he is in a coma
So be prepared 

I should pray
I thought
But I didn't
I should speak our love
I thought
But I didn't

I read aloud
I read The Half Blood Prince
I finished it
Late, late at night
Sitting by my husband's hospital bed

I should watch and pray
I thought
But I fell asleep

I woke at dawn
When the nurse came in

She checked my husband
His breathing
His pressure
His medication drip

I smiled at her
She smiled at me
And left the room

I stroked my husband's hand
I whispered his name
I said good morning
And he died

He took a breath
And then no more
Without agony
But also without trumpets
Without struggle
But also without radiance

And yet, wondrously
Without loss

Because I felt the room
Fill with Presence
Presence and peace 

There You are
I said
Thank You for coming

And so I sat
With Presence
Reluctant to ring
For the nurse

And have Presence
Flee into loss