#BlogElul Day 29

 Repent 

you start where you stand

review the past year and find

frayed places to repair

#BlogElul Day 28

 Give in and Aploogize

You gotta give some

relax the do and don’t

Forget about waiting on

someone else to strut

one foot and the other—

swallow being stubborn—

if you wait until one foot

standing on the other side

time may just keep moving—

no one hears when you shout

from that distance

say what you need to say now

#BlogElul Day 27

Bless

Blessings surround me

As I hear silence circle

I sense God’s presence

#BlogElul Day 26

 Create

i render a landscape in pen and ink

add mountains with raw umber

and burnt sienna watercolors—

step back and dip a brush into

indian red and rose 

add a hint of sun

spray water across the paper

take care not to blur colors 

dip a wide brush into cerulean

blue—a faint color waiting for

ultramarine to bellow across

white rough watercolor paper—

add trees—mountain paper birch, 

quaking aspen, and one unseen tree—

as an afterthought i ink in

a line of spruce pines

and a lone jack pine

i create an echo

a facsimile

#BlogElul Day 25

 I Intend

              “We are not sent into the world

                 to do anything into which

                 we cannot put our hearts.”

                  —-John Ruskin

my list

grows, a vine climbing

without pruning 

until it swallows time

with seductive possibilities 

 i will interrogate each item

#BlogElul. Day 24

 Hope

To love the other

To listen to silent words

and hear another

#BlogElul Day 23

 I Begin to Imagine Miriam’s Well

I take small steps,

follow a path 

filled with turnoffs,

stop

identify local topography

and pick two blooms

say their names 

then move on

to another meadow

I look for blossoms,

dig down to roots

and study each fiber,

anchor, support

water supply

well

#BlogElul Day 22

 

To End is Only To Begin Again

endings dwell in beginnings,

time continues, but

infinite hours remain beyond 

my province— 

there is yet time

to repair the places where

seams loosened and junctures 

separated, where frayed spots

grew thin—

time to walk toward another

extend a hand

and begin to patch

to mend 

to repair

to repent

#BlogElul Day 21

 Love

“Tell me, you who my soul loves... 1:7

“...and my insides stirred.” 5:4

                  Song of Songs

In the midst of scripture—a love poem

A paean to sensual delights

An invitation to love generously

I, too, feel my body shift and stir

as I whisper the lines

“I am my beloved’s, 

and my beloved is mine...”

#BlogElul Day 20

    Dare

I remember when

the best swimmer at the “Y”

dared me to swim 

two pool lengths underwater

I tried over and over

until a game of Marco Polo 

changed the subject 

Now I read and read

translation after translation

looking for a lens to 

understand each psalm

I dare myself to reimagine 

the words as mine

I am David

I am each person

who wraps herself in words,

crossing out

adding

until the psalm is mine

#BlogElul Day 19

Who Will Judge

    Who will remember

those who choose to cast off  the

needy among us

#BlogElul Day 18

 Ask

A simple question

of the universe

What happens to words

after they are said ?

#BlogElul Day 17

Awaken To Love

Take a deep breath, the 

universe opens her arms

and welcomes us all

#BlogElul Day 4

Understand

  

      After watching 

      the Republican National Convention

                   I can’t understand 

the accolades, the praise 

the parade of toadies

the lies, the painting

of  the other as dangerous

How do they excuse lies

How do they defend 

twisted words, a rewrite of reality

Don’t they hear the sound of steel boots

Don’t they know history 

Don’t they hear screaming rhetoric,

repetition of words, of framing

the other with symbols of fear

I hear the footfalls 

What don’t they see

What don’t they hear

What don’t they understand

about where we are heading

Their vision ignores the signposts

#BlogElul Day 16

Pray

I listen to G-D’s voice

when wind brushes against grass,

when waves gather momentum 

before spending their foam

on a shore dotted with Sandpipers

I see G-D’s hand in orange and red

hoodoos reaching upward—

becoming a cathedral of spires

I stretch my hand until my fingers 

touch layers 

of sandstone, shale, and limestone—

a story two billion years old

I inhale the aroma of rain washed herbs

I pray to this G-d of creation

#BlogElul Day 14

 Learn

Listen to silence

and hear the past 

View abandoned junctures

buried under slabs of time

that haunt the present

and wait for light,

for a chance to shake

off layers of neglect

#BlogElulDay 15

 Change

Summer creeps toward autumn

muting her colors, bringing a descent

of light, a rush toward dusk

Yet, a few days stay behind

unwilling to keep step

They capture summer’s warmth,

a reprieve, a chance to linger

##BlogElul Day 13

Remember

Before—

always before

Looking backwards

to recall a time before the now

A palmist reads shapes and lines,

hand shapes, fingernails, texture of skin

to create a text of what story remains

Scripture retells a narrative,

a history of a people, a key to remember 

our ancestors

#BlogElul Day 12

Forgive

To forgive

does not mean to forget

or blot out from memory

Some words remain

Some actions stay embedded

To forgive

does not mean to issue a free pass

or to engage in magic thinking

To me it means that I will

not carry around a lodestone

weighing me down

I will forgive words and actions 

but it doesn’t mean I will respect

or condone or not call out

I will not wait for you to ask

for forgiveness

It will be a free gift

A gift I will accept as well