#17

Gratitude

I want
a long walk,
David Whyte's voice,
and some kombucha.
That's it. That's all.
That's all I want right now.

But, truth be told,
there is more I want.

I want my family and rain,
avocados and
blueberries fallen into silver buckets.
The sound of the ocean on the shore
at night through the window
and my mother's voice
again and again and again.

Did I mention blueberries?
Friends that give bear hugs
and teach me to put on make-up;
a nephew
just like Quinn;
lobsters, of course,
and the sun,
warm,
drenching my skin.

I want snow and
silence so quiet it hurts your ears and
church bells, real ones;
hot chocolate, the real stuff.
Grampy's hands and Barbara's words.
Everything about Grampy.
Trees good for climbing, grass to walk barefoot in,
sage brush, piñon, lilacs, beech, birch, hemlock and willow.

Tea with honey
and your face staring at me
knowing there is nothing in the world
I could want
or need more
than that.
Truly, than love.

Also, my father's voice
stern and then joking
making me laugh;
And one of his lectures. And just him.
There is no end!

Mud,
children,
red lipstick,
and water to float in.
Baths,
waves,
sails filled with wind
and love,
always love.

I want-
this life
Mine.
All of it.
How could I ask for anything more?


-Llora H. Kressmann

#15

Tread beneath the waves
to where the images
cut closest
to the bone.
Get caught
in shame's teeth.

Now breath
big
for everyone
and let yourself move to see
what is really here.

Space
only space
quiet and black and open
timeless and windless
freedom.
Though it seems impossible to face,
Truly,  nothing here can harm you.

Now return.
Changed. Your cells
knowing the true story.

Replace the wind-weathered map in your heart
with the gold ring won.
Let the pages of those carefully kept volumes
fall away into
the day's slack tide;
The leather binding left on the shore for the gulls and stones.
You are done with that story.

-Llora H. Kressmann

#14

Whale Watch

On boats
it was always this:
my sister reclined in the stern
turns to a nap.
and I
dashing to the bow
as fast as I can
wind all the way through me if I can.
Until I am exhausted, sunburned and seasick, usually.
Throwing up off the stern
my sister, now awake, handing me a paper towel.
The root has a way of staying the same.

Our shells change
we flick them away into the wake of time.
Facing the moon each-by-each,
but after twenty years,
I twist my face to see the boy I once knew.
Oh, but he is there.
The root has a way of staying the same.

At the dinner table it was this:
you've turned all eyes to me with curious questions and excited reflections. And still I dread this. I falter and close at the sight of all this attention. The barking spider frozen beneath the blinding beam of a flashlight. Caught. No web in sight. No luminosity. Just the prisoner entranced by the light. The root has a way of staying the same. 

We've gone now
these many moons
and tides
more.
No one knows how long, really, the whales can live.
Beneath.
Those oceanic, blue-light
hearts
beating
in time
to
something
S l o w
Who knows how long they can go.
The root has a way of staying the same.


-Llora H. Kressmann

#13

Gold

I was walking this morning on these same streets.
So tiny I was
on these same streets
around my mother's house.

At five, around the block I went
alone. For the first time in my life.
It was a grand adventure.
That first block alone.
They let me go.
They always did.
I rode the Big Wheels.

Coming up the hill
beneath the giant Horse Chestnut trees,
whose husks lay splitting and browning in the curb
some still shining and smooth as a sweet cheek,
I had to stop and rest.

They called to my small hands.
I collected them.
As many as would fit
into pockets
and hands
and into the hollow spaces
of the Big Wheels, of course.
Why? Who knows.
But one cannot pass up
such treasures
on their first adventure
around the block.

Gone now, many years, the great trees on the small hill.
But in the place where Chestnuts lay, acorns pile
smashed by passing cars
and some, still, all green and lathered cannot be left;
call now to,
day-soaked hands
for filling up of pockets
for bringing home of gold.

Llora H. Kressmann

#12

                                                                                                 Toni Frissel

Over Breakfast

When will you stop running?
From life, from pain, from conflict, from the past?

This morning (though you did try, and failed),
you are on the pavement,
walking,
walking away.
Away from that house
away from all that.
You can't breath or think.
There is only tightness in the solar plexus, chest and throat.
You're walking fast.
You think, perhaps, to slow down.
This helps.
Allot.

You are planning your exist strategy when you hear yourself:
When will you stop running?

There's allot of momentum behind it,
lifetimes, it seems, of running.
Running to, running from, running after, but mostly,
running away.
You can't quite imagine staying put.
You know you have courage,
but not for that.
The image is of
stepping
right into
the fire.
Can you do that?

Kev took you swimming the other day.
Waves splashed against waves,
sloshing here and there.
"Is it safe?" you asked.
Confused, then smiling and laughing a little.
"It's safe."
Waves rocked and swept and dipped and pushed.
You felt stressed.
Kev said, without knowing your distress,
"I like when the waves toss you about and
you don't know which way they will come from."
"You do?" you question, astonished.

Here's the teaching then. Again, the ocean teaches to let go. And more. To go with the flow.

Of course this was not your nature in the sea. You reached your toe, down to the rock below. Ah. Holding there. Hoping for stability. Holding on in one place. Good. For just a moment.  Only that. Until, sweeping grace, lifts and pulls back into somewhere more open. It doesn't work. But that doesn't stop you from trying, again.

This is also the teaching. Have some compassion for these habits.

But, today, I do try.  Something new. To be like my friend in the sea. I lift off from the rock, into the rocking waves. It lifts me up and away, but only so far. It's gentle. Very. And without resistance, you know, the stress is gone. It works. Better. Much. So much. I'm having fun. I look for my friend. He's out now. Maybe smiling at me. I don't want to get out of the water.

When will you stop running? 
Today,
I'll try, a little,
to stay. Because I'm not holding on
anymore
to the rock.

I have faith in the sea and myself and this breath. I have faith in the sangha, my friend on the beach, that keep teaching me to stay. Gently turning me toward the notion that everything I want is in this letting go and being with. Right here.

I walk back to the house.
I open the door
and go in.
I stay.

I'm not holding on anymore.
I'm letting go
and finding
a new way
to be in the sea.


Llora H. Kressmann

#11

Stand still
I'm trying to
remember you.

The night
the loons
expectant hope
heart fluttering in my chest.

Behind the cabin, number nine
against the
paint-peeled doors
you leaned me gently
weight and all
moon peeking through to see
your face wide
holding me
this moment's ecstasy.

Two nine-year-olds
snuck out at night
to kiss among the pines.

You were my love
my one true love
of long ago
Tonight.


-Llora H. Kressmann

#10

The Day-Long Sit

Who would have thought
there was
a lotus
in my own palm

in my elbow, tooth and knee,
and behind my eyeballs
waiting?

Each spot holding
its messages of pain
of ache, of tension,
of tiredness acute
and now that I can see it
I'm going to say,

What a wonder to meet you
on your wicked edge
throbbing knee and tooth!

That's when I see,
the petals reaching out.

Of each and every ache and pain
of each and every throb
there was
a  bud
an honest lip of green
not doing anything
just unfolding
whenever I am ready
to let go.


-Llora H. Kressmann