#21

Sangha

The ocean
is my sangha.
The ocean is
the Three Jewels.
Naturally.
Teaching me
all day long.


-Llora H. Kressmann

#20

Home Coming*

This has always
been enough.
These people
this place
I wonder why
I ever left.

Really, it has always
been more
than enough.
In the way
a garden is more.
Flowers tall and short
bending and creeping
intoxicating fragrance
and color
so alive
all at once
in summer.
More.

Or a raspberry.
A raspberry!
Right?
More than enough.


-Llora H. Kressmann

*Thanks to Nicole for inspiring this poem.

#19

                                                                                              jayhookerimages

I've got
sea salt stuck
in my hair and
it makes it look
great.
And something
about the sea
makes me dance.
So I do on
the smooth wet sand
Then I'm singing
to the surf
at the top of my lungs.
Sand pipers,
gulls and crabs they
don't seem to care.
I think maybe
they like it
and I sing to them
more.

I wonder if passing cars think
there's a mad woman
down there on the sand?
But I don't really care
Because there is something
about the sea
that makes
me feel free.
That makes me
drop everything in
to this moment
and be.

So maybe I'm crazy
out here on the sand
Jumping and running and
spinning around
singing opera
and folk songs
and lullabies too,
but, you know what,
there is nothing, nothing
nothing to do.
The sea and me, have a
few things to say
to this world,
and this state
on this overcast day.

Wake up
all you crazies
just walking around
with your ear buds in
not making a sound
Today is the only thing
that we've got,
so take care
that you make it
and see it for once.
All you need is here
in this moment,
I promise its true,
so forget all these thoughts
that there's something
more important to do,
there's not
it is this
right in front of your face
in the rain
by the sea
when you slow down
your pace.

Don't wait
for the moment
when you get it all
right, stop the car
take a walk
and look out at the bright
moon on the horizon
tuning to night.

Come down to the sand
and get crazy with me,
It's your life
so live it
we are meant
to be FREE.


-Llora H. Kressmann

#18

Swallow Dance

Being a bird
like a swallow today
against the sea-salt sky
clouds, storm-tossed
holding down close
to the earth.

Awing in unison with
an ecstatic parade,
a tide of breathes
and swirls
amid branches
then twigs,
then pavement
and my face

Making no sound
except, perhaps,
did I hear,
a tiny
laugh?

#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