A world in a blade of grass

Today, outside of the house, my father's old truck is parked. It's a dark forest green Toyota pick-up truck. The tool racks and cabinets that he installed are still there. The fiberglass covered piece of wood that he placed in the bottom of the truck bed has deteriorated yet remains. This used to be my dad's work truck. He was a gardener and a landscape contractor in Santa Cruz, CA. After he died, the truck was sold to the parents of my dear friend Mark. It has been with them in Fresno,CA for seven years, give or take a few months. Two days ago Mark drove the truck from Fresno up to Portland,OR as he is borrowing it to move. He parked it in front of the house I now live in and graciously handed me the key so that I might drive it for a few days.
I look at this truck.
....I think of the many miles of road this truck has felt beneath its tires. I think of the dirt that encases it. Could there still be soil from Santa Cruz? From home? Just a small nugget clinging like an obstinate barnacle to the front license plate? It doesn't rain too often in Fresno so...hmmmm anythings possible right.
Is it true that I smell just a hint of fertilizer still wrapped in between the fibers of the seat covers...
...I think of the people that have driven this truck. What have their eyes seen? Did they listen to the radio or did they choose to listen in silence? Have there been tears shed in this truck? Have children played in this truck? How many beverages have been spilled in this truck? I try and look for traces.
...I think to myself, to my dad, " Hey, your car has had so many adventures since you've gone!" Then I think,.."that was a dumb thing to think....."
...I sat in the car today, in the drivers seat, and I thought of all that is silently shared between us and all that remains unknown or unspoken.
To my questions that will remain unanswered, I say,"I know."
There are little bits of dirt that have accumulated in the truck bed.In this dirt, miniature clumps of emerald green plant life has made a home for itself. I wonder if my father would like this..but then it occurs to me... little bunches of earth and plants in the bed of a gardener's truck!! It's so beautiful to me that I have to laugh.

Tell Me Why

Sailing heart-ships
thru broken harbors
Out on the waves in the night
Still the searcher
must ride the dark horse
Racing alone in his fright.
Tell me why, tell me why

Is it hard to make
arrangements with yourself,
When you're old enough to repay
but young enough to sell?

Tell me lies later,
come and see me
I'll be around for a while.
I am lonely but you can free me
All in the way that you smile
Tell me why, tell me why

Is it hard to make
arrangements with yourself,
When you're old enough to repay
but young enough to sell?

Tell me why, tell me why
Tell me why, tell me why

"Harmony"

We Make a Fuss

alike and no different
and such as
tawdry vultures

We ready ourselves with
inherently sufficient devices

Meanwhile
the idol
sun
blackens our darkness
and we move our faces away from
gentle shadows

Ah,
no wonder the resistance
no wonder the separation
and it is but a ripple
between
your seat and mine

A small thing and a grave loss

Were that we could embrace a little of both?
the dark and the light
just a little, just for now

a decent call to coalesce

would that the raven and the dove might hold one another upright
with kind regard

IMAGINE

IMAGINE

imagine a hand

one good for being
a person's touch on your shoulder

imagine a figure

that approaches like liberations
when talking solves the problems of anxiety

in a dream of words

which as far as reality's concerned
is impossible to distinguish from breath

look

here, too, across the floors
look here on the table out through the walls

here too
are the paths of freedom


-Marianne Larsen

Corridor

Sometime ago, whilst riding along the Springwater Corridor trail on a bike, I found myself in a stingy mean mood. I looked ahead and off to the side. In the patch of grass, trees, and shrubs that ran along the edge of the cliff, an older man was leaned against a shopping cart. It was piled high with his goods and belongings. I could see his smile yards away. Just as I passed, he lifted up his shirt and showed me the sizzling pink satin bra that he was wearing and appeared to fill quite well. I lifted up my hand and gave him the thumbs up sign and waved. He did it right back. As I rode out, passing the bright yellow Ross Island Bridge Cement rigs, I thought, "Holy crap, I really do get it good everyday."

Lela

Every single time I opened the door into the elderly care facility where Lela resided, oh such a tummy ache of dread. I might have to walk into the community room. I might have to cross in front of at least twenty folks in wheelchairs watching the news at noon. Sometimes it would be exercise time and everyone would be making "waves"or "wind" with their arms as the instructor lead them accompanied by the soothing sounds of nature on the stereo. Sometimes the kind lady with the guitar would come and play folk songs, happy tunes, with an encouraging, "Alright everyone, you know this one, "You are my sunshine..."Before I entered the room I would take a deep breath, curse quietly, hoping beyond hope that Lela would be stationed closest to the door. Why? Because for Pete's sake swooping her out of the room drew looks that I could hardly bear. Like the sorrowful gazes of a child who must watch from a window as friends and siblings rollick in play, their eyes were upon me. As Lela and I greeted each other with warm hello's and hugs--I'm just going to say it-- my heart felt a little rip. Even though I was there to read Christian scripture to a 95 year old hearing and visually impaired woman, I felt I was somehow responsible to care for them all. Or that WE were failing them all. Were it not for dear Lela.... As if I needed her to make me feel better, or more at ease, or any of that other nonsense. And yet she did. She smiled with her sea foam tinted watery eyes. She put her hand on my arm like that of the wispiest swift. She would gaze at me with such utter love and kindness that I wanted to scream out to the nurses walking by "I'm a fraud,I'm full of crap, what do I know about Jesus...sometimes I only believe in toasted marshmallow's!!! AHHHH!" Lela's relationship with God, I discovered, was quite real to her. When she would lie awake in her bed at night, when she would sit in her wheelchair hour upon hour, seemingly...endlessly...waiting..to be changed, bathed, wheeled to and from the community room, to the cafeteria for a breakfast of applesauce and oatmeal or a lunch of "zesty" macaroni and cheese, to her bed, to the bathroom..I thought "how, for the love of all that's green, does this woman endure?" She just believed she was going to meet him, the Lord that is, and when the world and its troubles got her down and blue, she would sing her hymns or silently repeat scraps of biblical wisdom. It was my duty, as a volunteer, to read from a book of daily bible sayings. Short, simple, and uplifting messages were what she was able to grasp and retain in her "moments of darkness." And so I would begin, when we were securely established in the lounge, (Oy Vey), the shouting of the bible. Almost nestled directly into her ear so that she might hear me (she usually smelled a tisch like burnt swiss cheese and salami that had been left out to long, but no matter, and I found it comforting) I vocally pressed on."SO DO NOT FEAR FOR I AM WITH YOU; DO NOT BE DISMAYED, FOR I AM YOUR GOD. I WILL STRENGTHEN YOU AND HELP YOU; I WILL UPHOLD YOU WITH MY RIGHT HAND!!" On many of my visits there would be a very special older couple who would be sharing the lounge with us. They were visiting, what I believe to be the man's mother, and typically had their twin pugs in tow. I will refer to them as The Mr. and Mrs. Crabby Crabby Two by Fours. Woeful tidings to us if they were already established in chairs, with their coffee, paper, and bouts of family gossip. As they watched me roll Lela into the room there came the beginning of the wonderful eye rolls and mutterings. Mr. Crabby would snort out, "Well Goddammit, looks like we're in for another SERMON." Lela could not hear these remarks thankfully, but I made certain to practice my--instant pulverization and death by gamma ray lightning rod volcanic acid glares-- in their direction. As I settled Lela and I into our respective corner of the room I thought, "Alright this one's a shout out just for you Crabby's.!" And here we gooooo "WEEPING MAY ENDURE FOR A NIGHT, BUT REJOICING COMES IN THE MORNING!!! It was all I could do to grip back the wildcat that desired to swipe with extended claws, especially when one of the crusty pugs attempted to climb on Lela's wheelchair foot rests. What the bloody hell did it matter to them after all! I wasn't offering up mini baptisms in the bathroom or handing out iced sugar cookies in the shape of the baby Jesus. And then....and then, I would focus on Lela and it just.. shut...me..down. And the story is, is that I have never before or since witnessed pure grace in action, with such consistency, and over the course of two years. Without the ability to study what had been her life's passion.With the clear awareness that she was in fact disappearing from us, she spent her time preparing for her next life. She slept peacefully at all, because the pictures that appeared in her minds eye were promises fulfilled. She saw her "True Father" and her "True home." A daydream meaning a night dream meaning a ubiquitous vision, meaning a tangible belief. And even if I had my own doubts, running the gamut from the afterlife to the present life to how to operate certain wine openers, I did not doubt her. And really, now, if I find myself in the grocery store, looking at selections of peanut butter, and a particularly ostentatious family cuts in front of me, knocks my bag down whilst a visibly irritated child boldly screeches, "I am not gonna EAT THE CRUNCHY KIND IF YOU BUY IT!!", I suck it in, a lot. Instead of saying.... oh so many things really, I think of Lela. And yes, I think, I can keep her close, I can gently hold this.

For,

.... a sister who is far from home, a brother who can't hear the laughter of his children, a sister who aches for her mother's sorrow, a brother whose insides have been torn asunder by infection, a baby whose heart beat too rapidly for his chest but continued to play, a sister who can no longer walk, hear, or see and she still sings, a papa haunted by a ghost of wrath, a sister whose bones crack from a hug, a brother who lost an organ, a sister who can't sleep without dreams that knash at her heart, a brother who lost his mind, voicelessly wandered filled with pills into a field to sleep altogether forever, a brother who was orphaned in less than a year, a brave sister who had to leave, a mother who could not, brothers and sisters that are cracking under the pressure, brothers and sisters that are lost, brothers and sisters that are full of shit.
I pray--that's right I said PRAY--speak, whisper, calmly, softly, and gently...to the wind..to the breeze, the air..that stirs through..I wish I wish you ease, such great ease.