Divine stereo listening with my eyes Closed in the sweet spot under the patio Not far from the hanging seed The crows confabulate in a Narrowing circle above my head The orange-breasted robins on the left and Plain brown wrens quarrel in the dense Mock oranges the gardener recently chopped The tops of making less space and more rancor. From somewhere on the right a bossy bluejay gets Off his feathery duff and regulates—loudly.
I sit so still a fat white dove comes to the feeder within Two arms’ reach and clicks seeds into his beak The sound of raindrops spitting against glass. My eyes are closed but I know he is fat because I have been Feeding my backyard aviary heartily—because his wing beats are Heavy when he flies away—and because the plastic feeder swings And squeaks on its rusty hook in his absence.
I know he is pure white because My imagination tells me so.
A too-warm-for-early-March breeze sidles In from the East—the one wind whose name I don’t know—and plays a single note on the Copper wind chime to my right before touching My hand the way a virgin who wants A lover with his whole body is only brave enough To suggest hand-holding One soft pinky tip to another.
The no-name virgin god-wind and all the bawdy Many-named and sun-shining gods and all the white And black and blue and brown and orange birds
And the magenta hibiscus—the coral The gold, the scarlet
And the topaz pool The empty terracotta pots All the cement the color of cement
Nothing separate—color, sound, Birds, flesh, wind. One Pulsing lover and beloved
And gratitude—the snake Who worships and adores his own tail His eyes half bliss slits as he consumes it Whole—too sweet for venom or bite And ever expanding this tail as it moves Through his body passing each one of his Seven humming hearts, emerging from Him longer and more glorious than before Expanding the circle endlessly Scale by glistening scale.
Seed by seed Petal by petal Feather by feather Melody by melody Ear by ear Both eyes closed.
My trick is a little garlic salt in the boiling water
My husband calls that the love
Garlic salt is my trick for everything holy in our food
My husband says it’s the love
Casino is playing in the family room
On our tiny television in the giant entertainment center
My mother bought thirty years ago when furniture
Was still real and heavy
One day I will get rid of it so we can have
A bigger TV, but today the little TV is enough
And I don’t mind the behemoth it sits in with
All my mother’s tchotchkes in the glass-doored
Cabinets and her ashes in a wooden urn on the corner shelf
The f-bombs from Casino float into the kitchen where
I am about to drain the garlic salt water pasta and
In my mind, I sing along with Joe Pesci as they come
My favorite movie, this scene one of my favorite songs
My husband and I appreciate vociferously his breath control
I drain the pasta and the salty steam rises to give me a much needed
Pore cleanser before billowing out of the open kitchen window
Into the twilight of a cool Southern California autumn that waited
Until mid-November to come but, blessedly, did come
I stop with the hot pasta strainer in both hands
Everything.
Everything.
Everything
Is perfect
Just as it is
The Goddess of All-That-Is
Has passed by my window
Come in through the open back door
Patted my poodle’s curly-topped head as she entered
Swayed into the kitchen
Stood beside me at the sink
Rustled her moonlight robes just enough so
That I could smell her whole dusky body
And her celestial perfume.
It smells like garlic salt, autumn, boxed pasta
Heavy wood, ashes, jarred sauce,
My husband’s day old Old Spice, puppy dog
And love
-M. Ashley
I am studying both Taoism and Zen Buddhism. In one of my Taoist readers for today, the author talks about how Taoists read and write poetry. That gave me a little kick in the butt to get back to it. And especially in a way that honors one of the strongest Is-ness or Flow or Tao moments I have ever had. The words still aren’t quite getting it, but it is a pleasure to try.
As if the merry current weren’t worthy As if anguish were worthy
I flail against it Take in great gulps Muscles give out Lungs fill up I go under surely The last time then rise Flailing harder
I end up downstream anyway The merry current is still merry
-M. Ashley
I have been studying Taoism which seems so natural to me and so lighthearted. Then I started flirting with Zen Buddhism which, by comparison, is difficult and austere. In meditation today it tickled me how this pattern shows up over and over again in my life: When something is easy and natural, I’m quick to toss it away because surely something that loverly can’t be truly valuable! I must SUFFER! I’m not sure if that’s a Puritanical echo or what, but such nonsense! The merry current is still merry and I end up downstream anyway. Why not relax and enjoy the flow?
“From fantasy comes union” that feels like Ecstatic gratitude. Electricity comes to mind But seems trite although there was literal Lightning in my gratitude ecstasy. I danced With my windows open in a storm drunk On an almost full bottle of table wine
I couldn’t have fantasized it better this stormy union
It wasn’t what I expected. How silly to expect Union to feel like freedom when really It is the ultimate binding—the ultimate us Together. We Eternally.
I flopped down in my unmade bed Left the last of the wine in a red plastic cup Gathering rain and the reflection of lightning on The dusty windowsill—dust made mud by the Gods’ rain. I wanted IT so much. I was naked. I wanted IT so much but The Lover said I was just a little too Drunk to have IT much Just now.
Crack open my soul and tell me what’s in there, would you? I am thinking of a decadent Easter egg with filling too bright and sweet to look at or taste. A Cadbury egg gone berserk spilling out gooey gold light.
M. N. Ashley 