"I choose, for moderate comfort, a thin tree
whose tallest branch has yet one leaf
hunched brown. A flag? Defiance? Obstinance?
A declaration I suppose.
I make it mine."
"while in heaven right next door somebody has plugged
a radio into a long extension cord and music from the local radio station has scared
the raccoons away and bushels of corn are picked by a woman who loves the feel
of the perfect ears in her hands because this is her heaven you see not the heaven
of raccoons"
Thirty spokes converge on a hub
but it’s the emptiness
that makes a wheel work
pots are fashioned from clay
but it’s the hollow
that makes a pot work
windows and doors are carved for a house
but it’s the spaces
that make a house work
existence makes a thing useful
but nonexistence makes it work.
— Lao-tzu from ‘Taoteching: With Selected Commentaries from the Past 2,000 Years’, tr. from Chinese by Red Pine
"Next morning I'll confess I overmarmaladed
the toast on purpose, trying to make up
for the chromatic deficiency, for orangelessness,
though the sky begins to show at times
we can observe, now, look -"
"when i am alone, i hear the thrum of blood pumping against my shirt. i feel my mother and grandmother wrap their arms around me until we are all chest to chest, the mirrors of our hearts beating in sync, as unending as the ocean lapping the shore"