To hear

Thank you, my friend (you know who you are), for the lovely green, bamboo imprinted batik with this quotation from Le Guin's Earthsea Trilogy. A worthy reminder.

To hear,

   one must be silent.

-Ursula Le Guin

I know this

Until I forget.

I am prone

To forgetting,

Until I remember again.

This seems the way

It goes:

Knowing

Forgetting

Only to remember again.

I build buffers of silence

So I can hear.

I stop speaking

So I can hear,

Maybe then

I speak.

If I remember.

Often I forget

Today I ponder what I wrote yesterday and the day before.  And the day before that.  Most often what I write has to do with what catches my attention in the morning.  Simply that. I wonder about returning to preach occasionally, and where and when and how that would be.  I remember my seminary preaching professor who declared: Every sermon is not a sonnet.  My sermons have never been sonnets.  Neither are my poems.  With the exception of the haiku, and an occasional villanelle, I write freely and shortly. Sermons too.  

Often I forget

What I wrote yesterday.

Once it is released

Into the world,

It becomes part of the whole.

It becomes part of the mosaic,

Or perhaps

It is grout.

No telling where

It will end up;

No telling

If it will be stone

Or binder

Or maybe

A place holder

To be discarded

When something better
Comes along.

Rosebush

It seems the world is in full bud and bloom whether I have paid attention, or not.

The rosebush

I never pay attention to

Has buds this year

To beat the band.

The peony behind the garage

Promised pink

Once I turned the corner.

I forgot

It was there.

I wonder what else lurks

Despite me

In spite of me

Maybe even simply

To delight me

With potential bloom.

Bongo Board

There is so much to learn from everyone I encounter.  It*s all dialogue.  Yesterday I remembered the Bongo Board we stored in the closet off the living room when I was growing up. I remembered I was good at balancing on it.   The board lived in that living room closet.  The closet also stored the dress-up clothes.  One memory unpacks another.  I remember new things I*ve forgotten.

God sends me people.

They struggle with things,

They dance with things,

I need to weave

Into my life.

When they leave I think

Oh that*s why you came.

When they leave

I think

Until I remembered to say

That one thing

Out loud,

Until you named

That one difficulty,

Until you told me

About that particular

Dance partner,

I forgot.

Yesterday was about balance,

Bongo boards,

And God inhabiting

Everything.

God sends me people.

They help me remember

New things

I*ve forgotten.