bunk bed

We buy her a bunk bed. There is an old man who lives north of here who builds them. He has built hundreds of bunk beds, he says. She wants one (she really really wants one) and the layering of sleeping children seems like a logical solution for this little room. Her father calls the old man who builds bunk beds, and the old man builds us one. The old man then drives south to our house, carries the bed up the stairs in pieces, and then builds it again. The yellow pine wood looks like honey against the pine needle green paint of the walls. Most nights, she climbs the ladder, a lanky girl of 6, and flops onto her mattress, shifting and sighing before eventually sleeping. Some nights, she is afraid to be alone waaaaaaay up there beneath the dark ceiling and her cold comforter. And so, risking a kick to the leg or head or hip, she slides along the wall of the bottom bunk to be beside her two-year-old brother. With gentleness, she pulls the blanket over her belly, smiles as she sinks onto a pillow, and closes her eyes. Soon, she is silent and sleeping, calm and happy to be close to the breath and skin of kin.  

Abundance

I ponder and prance upon the enormous boom and bloom of abundance. It is the dinner plate dahlia with its mane of 151 pink silk petals. It is the sea at sunrise just before summer when we wake early and run barefoot on the cold, wet sand. It is invisible. It is often unintentional. It is as the stars are in the endless universe - brilliant little lights in the pitch-black night. It is like breath - nothing and yet, everything. It is a bubbling of joy and acceptance. It is a still dance and a silent symphony. It is a vibration, a hum, a beat, a buzz. It is a tide of blackbirds as they move like a wave on the wind. 

 

Liberation

On my birthday, I wrote. 

I am 38. And I am a wise old wild child. 

This was my liberation statement. 

I yearn for liberation…from costumes, awkward interactions, and inauthentic actions. I want to be naked in my raw radical truth. I yearn to be everything, and yet nothing. Oh, how vague and vulgar. I yearn to be free as the fleeting flowers. Free as the fleeing feathered geese. This is the wise in me. And this is the wild in me. Liberation is a peak, a perch of earth, and a ragged nest of spirit. It is a place where I need no validating word, no smile, no nod even. True liberation is found on the inside. From there, it burns. I am the liberation I seek. It is the song sung from the marrow of my pure and ancient soul. 

And so again I say goodbye to the push and pull of social media. And so once again I say I am hidden in the solitude of old life. I can tell you that I drink joy every night. But you don't need to know that. You don't need to envy me. Nor do I need your envy of me. 

Circle

I am here (I say, pointing) in the circle of my wholeness. Not done, but open. Not quite finished, but seeking to reach the authenticity of my deepest, truest, fullest self. It is a circling. It is a sweeping, swooshing circling. It is a meandering, a wandering, a wilding. It is indeed, a rebelling (no, no not regretting), but a leaning into the learning, into the understanding of being and of being human. 

WORTHY

I talk quickly

to everyone 

but 

children.

I think I think my words are  

unworthy. 

Sometimes I am silent. 

And sometimes my words want out 

like my inhale wants out and so out they go...

...and yet I know

I must breathe and speak more slowly. 

My words are worthy. 

I am worthy

and the children and I  

all know it. 

GRACE

Thank you, Air
sky, stars, sun, moon, wind -
I breathe you in

(we breathe in, we breathe out)

Thank you, Water
cloud, rain, river, pipe, sink -
I drink and drink

(we clink our glasses and drink) 

Thank you, Dear Earth

dirt, root, fruit, flower, seed -
I eat and eat!

(we eat!)

*I wrote this last November for my Montessori classroom. Now, as my small family gathers for supper, we too recite this grace, this gratitude, together. Please feel free to borrow!* 

WHITE

Oh, Grandmother Widow,

On the day of his funeral, in the cool April breeze, your beauty causes me to wonder about white, and about time, and the acceptance of it. Imagine if everyone wore white at weddings, not for "purity"(for that's nobody's damn business), but for hope. Hope that one person has found another person to love and love and love until both of their bodies are crowned in such soft magnificence as this. 

From my quiet night to yours, I write. 

with love and love and love,

Rachel