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New world

i’ve gotten a little older lately and i can’t see as far ahead as i used to and that bothers me because in the fog i start seeing shapes and those shapes look like dead ends but in the end it’s just my pattern-seeking brain trying to find the worst-case possibilities and try to avoid them and sadly there’s nothing i can do to clear the fog or light the way or even unsee the things in the gloom but one thing i can do is eat my strawberries and pet the two-headed calf while counting the stars by their ancient light in the night’s great dome and another thing i can do is understand that even while this world might be ending to one degree or possibly another the ending will not last and there will be another world and if i make it there by the glory of any god that exists or is imagined in it i will find a way to love it and celebrate its magic and even here in this world between however long it lasts i will find the beauty and fun however well hidden because there is a difference between dying and dead and while change is frightening it has a second face which is possibility and hope is seeing that second face whenever i feel the presence of the first and that is the balance that allows me to greet the sun again as it rises against all imagined odds over the day’s
new world.

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Even as it breaks

It’s so easy to break things –
trust, a heart, a nation.
So much more work
to build.

It’s easy to get sad
and feel helpless.
It’s easy to get angry and
want to break something back.

It’s difficult when your ears
are filled with the sound of shattering
to hear the blackbird sing
or to look up and see the trees’ fingers.

The hurt is designed
to make you feel blind. 
Wipe the blood
from your eyes

and take a moment
to notice everything 
even as it breaks
a seed becomes
a burning sun
take the time
dissention
to love
some-
thing
and
make
it

grow

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Adapt

Enclosed, uprooted,
and left hungry, 
I will find my own way.

I reach to the sun and
create
my own sustenance. 

Once I’ve had enough,
I put down roots
and share with my neighbors.

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Sunrise

I never meant to land in the water. 
I’m no sailor, no navigator.

Tectonic forces have cast me adrift,
the land ran away from me, 

islands on the horizon receding
faster than I could learn to turn a rudder.

I lay for ages in the cold doldrums, water
turned to lead, air to sulfur, I could not breathe –

until, gradual as the dawn, the arrival
of these misty storm birds,

who pull me forward until I am upright
and regain momentum,

moving toward the harbor I cannot see
but have faith is there beyond the swells.

Albatrosses, frigate birds, gulls?
I don’t know, or much care.

They are my wings, my strength, my sails,
this boat, the wind, the waves,

as am I, in turn, for them, 
hoisting each other toward the sunrise.