Dance Lessons

(It is a process: understanding life. We do it in family. In dreams.

In thought and writing.

Even dancing.)

Try to see beyond my blindness.

Say it's all good.

What eyes now blind me?

Oh listen! It's ticking.

Tapping. Clicking

So much to write

Caution to the wind.

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

In gusts of hot air

and white-wood fuzz.

Nothing that words will fit.

Membership in the life club: Savants.

One word, idiot, comes to mind.

But I love me anyway.

In my impatience.

Fingers dance in broken steps.

Mind penetrates the dance floor

of plastic and glass.

Not good -- till sunset.

Oh magic.

But I can feel it now

like Mom's silent prayers,

so loud, nothing else sounds,

but the absence of Dad.

Payday. And The Outrigger.

He's home other nights.

Dinner. Chores. News in black and white.

All is good, not thinking about it.

So it is a dance of dreams.

Commencement and light.

If I made this, I made it with he

who was my brother.

Father, Mother.

Two step. Or square dance.

To penetrate the dance floor.

Or is it the ceiling? Translucent.

Light breeze. White curtain.

They are both there now.

A visit after sunset.

In prayer and The Outrigger.

The music we wrote

and learning to dance.

Not easy but sweet.

These lessons of love.

Still learning.

© 2013 Ardi Keim 6/28/13

Shining

A reading from Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones. The two lives of a writer. We are the writers. Fireplace across the room.
Begin.

Dance, Flame! Shine!
Your fire is brighter this time.
Burnishing new images.
Protecting the peace of mind.
Past holidays have once more convened.
The hearth is the venue
Home-making the show.
The heat, comfort—
Sweet ambiance of kinship
Is the heart song uplifted.
Grandfather's cadence calls the clock
As the past reminds the present.
Grandmother's pie.
This is Love.
Reflection and glow.
Fulfilling. Abundant
As right satisfaction.
Rings true. Is love.
Is more than the writer's imagination.
More than the sleeper's dreaming.
All else doesn't matter.
Is Love. Shining.
,

Mothers Day 2006

My brother sent this to me after her visit.
Mom by his azalea's. She loves flowers.

I wrote this one two years ago. Still, I can't love her like I feel I should--like she loves me. (I guess such love is for my daughters now.) When I call her today, and say, Happy Mother's Day!, she may say, It is? Even being with my brother celebrating the occasion, she won't remember why. Seems sad now. But it really isn't. Nothing negates a love lived fully. It's like money in the bank--still drawing interest. And she always remembers who I am.

At Your Breast

O Mother, at your breast
I first remember with my mouth and ear
Big, brown nipples, soft and heart beat on my cheek.
What nourishment you gave me!
And ever after
Every woman is a measure of your love.

O Mother, on your knee
I've seen the world through new eyes
By the song of your life
And the call of your smile's voice
See the bird. Touch the tree.
Read to me
And learned a measure of your love.

O Mother, at your side
Hand-in-hand. My first guide
Through baby steps and walking miles.
Early life a journey at your side
in memory of left turns right.
And then forgot
the first true measure of your love.

O Mothers Day has come and gone
some fifty times since I was born.
I've given you but small return on
The gift you've given me.
If I were judged as royalty
my worth could only be minute
by the measure of your love.

Here's today's haiku for Mom:

laundry day

against summer skies
silver maple quickens in breeze
she dances with shirts

My sister said it another way in Dance Lesson:












See also my other tributes to Mom in River-Tree Whispers.