It wasn’t there yesterday, but
it’s there today,
a large brown bug,
still, unmoving.
When I check again, it’s still there,
still unmoving.
I move closer.
I pick it up.
I turn it over. A tiny
seed’s held tight in
its grasp…What will
I die holding?
JDG
It’s not that there’s no place to turn
when doubts abound,
when things get rough,
when pain persists.
If we open up, we might see
beyond our fear
to another
trajectory.
With that counter-instinctive turn
we can slowly
make our way to
love’s outstretched arms.
JDG
Where do I go when I am lost,
when mind races,
when, heart beats fast,
and fingers shake?
Where do I go when I am lost,
when feet won’t move,
when mouth goes dry,
and eyes just stare?
Where do I go when I am lost,
when what I knew
and the one who
knew disappears?
JDG
When there’s just a hint of a storm,
my dog Jimmy
shivers over
to me and asks
“How could you have let things come to
this? Haven’t I
made myself clear?
Storms are scary.
You have to nip them in the bud.
Help me out here.
Just get a grip
and make them stop.”
JDG
It must have been beginner’s luck.
It certainly
wasn’t skill or
experience,
but as I sat with my sangha,
eyes closed, breathing
in and breathing
out, struggling
with heavy feelings of despair,
a purple and
pink “Hi” appeared
and made me grin.
JDG
Four years ago today, on September 4, 2011, I started this blog with the following poem:
The Shed
Before even a road was laid
the shed was there,
nestled amidst
tall pines, scrub trees;
a holding place for lawn tractor,
shovels, hoes, rakes,
and a woman,
who, mowing done,
rested and watched two great blue
herons soar and
nest, their place found,
hers yet to be.
What I didn’t know then, but what I have come to know, is that it is in the act of writing that I have found my place. Thank you for joining me here on aholdingplace.
JDG
The biggest difference between
Jane Austen and
me is that she
wrote and wrote well
while all around her, daily life
swirled and stuttered.
I write too, but
not at all well
in this cacophony of kids,
and cats and dogs
and plaintive pleas
of look at me.
JDG
Sitting on the riverbank, I
watch my thoughts float
by. I’ve learned at
last to follow
them and I rest content. Then
somehow, someway,
somewhy, somewhen,
I find that I
have plunged on in after them
and together
we are carried
far out to sea.
JDG
I do nothing and they appear
each and every
year, their golden
faces tilted
in the sun, their black eyes aglow.
Joined by other
rooted friends, they
beckon bees and
hummingbirds, butterflies, and me
to linger for
a season til
they have to go.
JDG
One day I refuse to act on
a suggestion
that could ease my
tension, even
solve a problem. The next day I
decide to act.
What’s the difference
between one day
and the next? The difference lay
not in the day
but in me and
my willingness.
JDG
aholdingplace 