Re-beginnings

Seattle

Touched by your eyes, I quake. Whatever is good has ceased to flow.
I throw the poison mirror away. The walls close towards center.
Barely room to breathe.

Morning comes and again I resolve to survive the day, overcome this.
We had planned to do that. Times have been better. My flesh hurts.
I plunge back into sleep.

But the urge returns, jarring open my eyes. You aren't here.
What am I creating? Or am I just re-living-living the worst
old outcomes? There was a truth here. Sinking, my thoughts
become seeds seeking the comforting dark. Memories
are of no value. Where I am now I am safe—
between everything—away and alone
under a high cloud sky.

In this inner world of the closed flower there is a moment’s rest.
The wind and tide erase all. I do not speak the language here.
It is a comfort. I communicate through half tones, faint smiles.
Outside the petals, rain and finally a clear sky and distant
mountains asleep under their snow. Having held back
too long, I do not cry. We bend or break.
Now I lay me down to sleep.
The rain drenched petals creak.
I lower myself into the storm—
small boat, small wings—
to try the sea.

asha

Return

to the disembodied
painted faces of the inner air
the stone voice speaks
the whorls upon waking weep
the swamp of singing reeds
the growing world
turns to listen
time
delirious with eternity
sleeps on
there is no answer

in the winter sun
birds are thinking
they do not reply
I have returned
from a long journey
I have changed

the end and the beginning
stir and separate my thoughts
it is noon at my place on earth



asha
published in Sein und Werden

Life at the top of the stairs

For Fleek

Having to be somewhere—
I found myself living on the landing  
at the top of the stairs.

A thousand times a thousand times
I finished in my mind the unfinished
painting leaning against the wall.

The eight-legged one,
tiny Protectorate of the Shadows
and her silken sacks of eggs,
she alone knows the rest of the story—



asha

Yellow Shoes

When I had feet me shoes were yellow
ah yellow as pollen they were
bright as lemons
bright as me lad's smile
bold as his laugh
an oh how I danced in me shoes
all night
a swarm a bees
drunk from the flowers
sportin their yellow pants an boots
knew not as many turns as me lad an me
not haf as many

an when
in the slow river
a bare foot we went a wadin
me lad an me
an bare we were from toe to head
a hand an hand
me yellow shoes was glad to wait
all hodgepodge with his
for shoes has no need a feet
though feet has a need a them
but now
old as I be
I has no need a shoes
not yellow 
not brown
but glad I am
glad as I was when I was a lass
for I got me me lad
an I rather him than me feet.


asha
—written at the behest of Lawson Fusao Inada

Augury for the Child

Even as a child
I knew I could possess nothing
so I renounced everything
but childhood itself.
And as a child
I knew knowledge
could not be enough,
that only a homing instinct
would be much use after all.

So abundant
are the moments of truth
diamond drops
cupped in the uncountable
small green hands of morning—
even now I do not wish
to turn back from love.

Knowing I will forget
again and again
how to laugh
and how to cry
and what you mean to me,
and knowing
that each moment of love
finally presses its body
in wet fallen fragrant petals
against the stone to dry
I must welcome strangers
and imperfections.

I have seen hope
like spring return
again and again
and the sleek and shiny
lights of rain
dancing everywhere.

Even now
it is wise to trust.


asha

After Death

As moon hidden by morning
as water enters earth
as the blossom’s beauty quivers
falling from the fruit within
as night embraces effaces erases light
and light
being diminished or absent
speaks only in dream
I went to the river saying,
River,
here are my voices.
Return them to the sea.

After death—
I entered River’s mind
and River’s song
which fills the twilight
replaced the sun.

After death—
seeing through River’s eye
knowing night by many names
I journeyed far to reach and kiss
the pulse of earth and sea.

Returning—
new mind
a spring rain
slowly descending black bark trees.

Returning—
young among the old
new moon asleep on the sea.

Returning—
I moor my ship
upon the wind’s voice.


asha

Music Theory

for John Chance

In the beginning was Theory and the Theory was made flesh
so that we could find our way home. I walk slowly
through the points of rain.

In the beginning was sound and it was everything, against all odds.
“Never was there a time you and I did not exist, Arjuna.”
I am a ball of wings rolling toward you. Theory become flesh.
The music is in the gaps.

I enter the lobby. "I've come to see my uncle," I say.
"Where will you be waiting?" says the lady in the glass cage.
"The waiting room", I reply. She will not meet my eye.
I am announced through seven miles of hallways.

He appears, hollow and weary on his cane.
It is not a walking stick to navigate the world of the living.
It is a handrail to the grave.

He is an unanswered question. We step out into the mist and stop.
I watch him openly, as one watches a child, the insane, or the dead.
“Listen to the trees,” he says, rolling his eyes up and back.
“It is good to be alive; to share a little company now and then.”


asha

Blue Period

I painted a moon to look at
and gave it a wild sky to rule
then sat down and listened
to the night blooming flowers open
rhythm upon rhythm

I painted a blackness to sleep in
and forgot myself
among the
disinterested
layers of easy paint

I painted an empty room for clouds to fly over
I painted a silence and fell to dreaming . . .


asha

Torn Page

What do I begin with this ongoing
omni-directional conversation of ours,
these fever dreams where meaning
evaporates just as everything is about
to make sense? So many doors but—

turn back and the hall becomes a maze.
Going forward solves nothing.
I begin again where I fail to be.

The fever breaks. I am in a strange room.
I am no longer afraid. The white sheet,
which is the wind, caresses me naked.
Fire cools me. Everything is in reverse
and unraveling. Finally, I can breathe.

A hummingbird flits through my rib cage,
pauses on my sternum. I have no sugar.
I know the passing hours by their colors
and sounds, and I with them—
an ancient tooth in the tide, visible—then gone.


asha