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

Invisible but strong
The thread, the root
The skein, the net
Connects all trees
Spruce and pine
Crepe myrtle and mimosa
Tree of heaven and treasured maple

The thread, the root
The skein, the net
Holds us too
As we stumble and stutter
Causing maple to tremble
And pine to sigh

Delicate
White green
Sunlit tendrils
Carolina jasmine
Almost kiss
Drooping
Furry spruce

Small stone
Celtic cross
Shelters 
Under
Plum yew
-	Cephalotaxis harringtonii 
According to Woody
Who rocks gently
In his rustic chair
Next to me
On our half sunken
Back porch

Overhead fan spins
Slow
Water
Gurgles and plinks
Jug to jug
Into the tiny pool
Harboring broken pottery
Ceramic frog
Wire duck
Fat squat plaster bird
Speared ferns
Purple tradescantia
Red hearted coleus
And one small 
But growing
Japanese maple

Red breasted robin
Pauses
On the half collapsed
Bamboo fence
While her chicks wait
Open mouthed
In the nest
In our porch rafters

The small simple
Richness
Of the world
From our back porch
Is too vast, too complex
For one poem

As spring waits
For summer
As bud waits
For blossom
As tadpole waits
For frog
As gravid waits
For birth
As dawn waits
For sun
As dusk waits
For moon
As lover waits
For loved

So in holy hope
I wait

I am a queen
With a crooked crown

over what crooked realm 
do I reign

when sometimes
(too often)
not even my own will
obeys

I walk a crooked path
To my crooked throne

I think a crooked thought
Cry a crooked tear
Laugh a crooked laugh

But my love is straight
And true
Crowning you

I scatter pieces
Of myself
Throughout my day

My trail is littered
With a thought here
A worry there

The drooping branch
Of an unfulfilled promise

The lichen covered log
Of old resentments

Browning leaves
Of once was

Slippery pebbles
Of never was

Wishes dropped here
Daydreams there
Distractions everywhere

Until
In my car
At a red stoplight
I watch an ant
Crawl up the windscreen

Ah, I think
That ant never has to try
To collect again
The scattered pieces
Of itself

But I am human

I lose
And I find

I scatter
And I recollect

I see an ant
And I give thanks