OSI Prompt #55: Farewell

This week, my daughter and I have been working to clean out the beloved house we called home for 31 years. We made the difficult decision to prepare it for sale. So this week's prompt is timely.

Scrubbing windows in

this empty winter house,

memories echo here,

music, laughter, tears -

let the blessed light in!

Bare old plum tree

through the bedroom window,

split so deep now --

will you bloom again?

Closing my eyes, I see

your spring blossoms, white petals

pirouetting down,

chickadees nesting in the hole

under your precarious branch --

the one my grandfather trimmed

and patched so many years ago

Late summer, mouth and

baskets full of yellow plums,

then copper and gold leaves

litter the ground, stars appear

like Christmas lights in your branches

One moonlit snowy

night, two fawns, two does appear;

ears upright, eyes bright,

standing beneath your branches -

I held my breath!

OSI - Prompt #54: Fork in the Road

The good road, and the

road of difficulties cross;

that place is holy

Holy is the place

we begin again in the

broken heart of now

Now stepping on an

unknown path, seeking only

to be whole again

Do you sometimes encounter ideas that hit you with such force that they immediately penetrate your psyche and become part of the fabric of how you see the world? Perhaps even become a kind of spiritual talisman that you return to again and again? This week's prompt brought to mind two such ideas for me. The first was revealed to me in a prayer spoken by the Ogala Sioux medicine man, Black Elk, in Black Elk Speaks, by John Neihardt (paraphrased in the first stanza.) The idea that when we come to a place in our lives where we are faced with this kind of soul-compelling choice -- that it is a holy place --has stayed with me all my life. The second talismanic idea attached itself to this one, and came when I learned that the words 'whole', 'healing', and 'holy' all share a common Sanscrit root.

OSI Prompt 53: Circles

Happy 1st Anniversary OSI! Here is an older piece, written nearly 14 years ago, the night before the birth of my first grandchild. My daughter had already named her, Sequoia. I presented this poem to her on her 13th birthday last summer, as part of a 'coming of age' collection of writings that my daughter put together for her.

To Sequoia, under the Full Moon

Standing now

as I did then, window-framed,

body carved in moonlight,

soul lit with wonder --

Then, at the edge of my girlhood,

unspoken, unseen, unimagined possibility

beginning to dawn within.

Full moon floods the sky tonight,

blanketing now

child of my womb --

womb-full,

ripe now, ready to begin

a new circle.

Now, on the eve

of my grand-mothering -- this too

unknown, unimagined possibility,

this grandmother body

still encircling (not enclosing) my own babe,

her womb full of potentiality,

reality, already named (before the dawn)

Sequoia ('close to God')...

I am woman,

now under the full moon

womb full of wonder,

grandmother to be.

OSI - Prompt 52: Twilight

Light lingers here

like a lover,

reluctant to leave the Beloved

Meanwhile

these waters - ever jealous

look on, recording

every nuance of their

tender encounter

OSI Prompt #51 - Spectral

(Photo by Michael Gallagher for Missoulian)

This last week, a wake was held for Agnes 'Oshanee' Kenmille.  She was ninety-three years old when she passed, and one of the best known and most beloved elders of the Flathead Reservation, where I am blessed to call home.  Oshanee was nationally renowned for her hide tanning and beadwork.  But beyond her mastery of the traditional craft she practiced and taught, she was known and loved for her remarkable spirit. I am not a Tribal member, but every time I saw her, I was deeply aware of what a treasure she was, and thought to myself that this beautiful woman knows something about living that we all need to know - about finding meaning and purpose in life, about enduring, loving, and about finding joy in what one has in the present.   I only saw her a few times a year, but she left an indelible impression on my heart.

  

Thank you for the prompt.  I offer this in memory of Oshanee .....

Crescent moon eyes

look up, twinkling

round shoulders shake

with laughter's echo

So many years, showing

the way, with nimble hands and heart

softening hides, velvety white

then gloves, vests, moccasins

Ninety-three years walking

this earth, again and again

the joy of now

Incalculable

the loss, a perfect Oshanee

shaped hole in their hearts

Yet time will endow

star-studded skies and aching

hearts with twinkling eyes

and crescent moons

OSI: Movement

Having trouble sleeping tonight.  Full moon!  Why fight it?.......

You may have to click on the image in order to read it.

OSI Prompt #46 - Summer's Day

Late start this week! I confess that the prompt did not compute at first -- with lots of old snow and ice in the yard, 'a summer's day' seemed out of reach. But then........ I remembered all that sleeps under the ground. I felt how tired I am, and how much I need to rest. So I took a nap today, and what was on my mind when I awoke was the yin / yang symbol. This was what came out of the prompt and reflections. (You may need to click on the image to be able to read it.)