What You Remember

As Grace has reminded me "this is a project about trying your best. trial and error is part of growing. it's highly acceptable."

* * *
What You Remember
For Grace Brogan

Sometime after one
she woke to the clang of iron on iron.
Some scuffling and the single room
flooded with light and warmth.

* * *

It was simple--
and delicate--
this casual exchange of souls.
So easily damaged by saying too much
or not quite enough.

* * *

The rasp of iron,
crackling wood again.
Murmured thanks.
Rustling across the room.

* * *

Just there--outside
the single paned window--
snowflakes break the gathering dark.
By morning their footprints will be gone.

* * *

Wild Geeseby Mary Oliver
You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —

over and over announcing your place in the family of things.