When everything in your world shifts, slips like a puppy in a flatbed, these are the things that are steady and true... the sea, the stars, your own searching heart.

not in Paris

I keep a ledger, row on row, tracings of sky
and begonia. The columns, creamy and wide,
wait for jots of Euros spent in bookstalls
and smart cafes. But I have filled them
instead with what the prairie gives, thoughts

of storms, words like thunderhead and thistle.
The Solferino bridge will not fit between
these pages. The buskers beneath do not care
for the silence of closed books. Montmartre’s
portraitists cannot be plucked like daisies

and conserved for some lonely year to come.
I plow these paper fields with a fine tip pen,
allow myself to fancy up the margins
with little sketches of the Sacre Coeur,
the smudgy dusk at the Jardin du Trocadero,

wobbly wildflowers that skirt the sensible
crops I sustain. I am not in Paris, nor Brazil,
but planted deep on this invariable plain.
It spreads before me, a true accounting that bears
with grace the indulgence of my penciled larks.

You just might hear the universe.

It could happen.

Really.

hello there...

As observing detail is clarity,

So maintaining flexibility is strength;

Use the light but shed no light,

So that you do yourself no harm,

But embrace clarity.

~Tao de Ching~

cough...

How lovely to read this story... http://news.aol.com/health/story/ar/_a/air-too-dirty-to-breathe-in-345-counties/20080313094209990001 ...

I am not surprised to see my county (Collin, Tx) named as one of the 345 US counties where the air is too dirty to breathe. We are an inch from Dallas. While this is not shocking news, it is very disturbing and all the more reason to move to some seaside locale where the air blows clean (er) off the water.

I have to say this does put a bit of a taint on my adoration of the beautiful Texas skies.

I am off to hold my breath...

One joy dispels a hundred cares.

~Confucius

denied!!!

Well, the weather has turned decidely ugly... so my sis and I have cancelled our quest for baubles. Instead I am huddling by my fake logs, swilling coffee and watching the rain/sleet/snow mishmash tumble from the sky. It is cozy inside... a good day to stay home and maybe make some art.

winter's remnants, rhinestones & footwear...

Old Man Winter is such a jokester. We had snow on Tuesday (several inches... a LOT for north Texas)... nearly 70 and sunshine yesterday... and guess what? Snow is predicted for today and tomorrow. It is as cold as a well digger's ass! Whatever... I have some cute boots.

So anyway, my sis and I are taking a break from trying revamp our entire lives to go on the hunt for cheap jewelry. Well, she has a doc's appt. just up the road from trinketland... it's just so damn close. How can we NOT go? And anyway, this deal of reaching a higher spiritual plane, freeing your life from crap, blah, blah, blah... well, it is a bit taxing and a girl just needs a little bling to ease the journey...

waiting for Mozart

On the outskirts of Vienna,
when winter comes, dull and frozen,
even secrets seek the sun.
Words held in doorless chambers
gather urgency and slip somehow
into my throat, wait to ride
a warm whisper into the frigid air.
Silence forgets its place, joins
the unrest and wonders how it stood
so long, tongue held, hands folded.
Into the weakened light a clamor
is released, a gust of minor revelation
that stirs no page, nor lifts the sheerest curtain.

I confess only to the sunset, offer declaration
to the silhouettes of bare sycamores.
Yes, I am still here, draped in wide ribbons
of remembrance, swathed in crepe,
blacker than December’s midnight,
a shadow beneath a petticoat,
frayed hem iced and muddied.
Here, near the river’s rimy edge, I stand
and think of monarchs and willows,
moonlight impearled, the water thawed
and bright with fishes.

I have never stopped, not for one breath,
gathering branches with tight fists
of buds, never let go the hope of forced
blooms set in jar by the western window
and arched toward winter’s weak sun.
I am quiet and cold with twilight
close on my heels. Tonight sleep will bury me
in a snowfall of pale petals. I will wait
one more day.