Like Words Together Reflections from the deep end of Practice.

Eddies in the Dust of Rage

Broken Piano Foot - Our Basement, Portland, Oregon - June 2010

Today was another page in the Troubles of Mom, sadly. Still don't want to say much in such a public forum, but the end result is that I'm feeling angry and sad tonight. So angry that the poetry I come up with is something like this:

Anger.
Angry.
Angrier.
Rage.

sigh

I'm reminding of a song from Bruce Cockburn, "Pacing the Cage", which has the amazing lyrical image of "eddies in the dust of rage".  The difficult waiting game, waiting out the rage, reminds me a lot of this song tonight.

And then on my commute home there was an enormous rainbow, clearly seen in a glorious arc across a gray, spring sky.

It is hard practice sitting between the simple joy of rainbows and unethical people hurting my Mom. Practicing with my own anger very certainly feels like all the training wheels are off.

And yet, there is this nagging commitment to poetry...

Waiting with Anger

Difficult
Is the
Practice
of patience.

Distilling
Anger,
Impatience,
Irritation,
Into the
Stillness
Of the
Heron fishing.

There's a video on YouTube of Bruce Cockburn performing "Pacing the Cage", check it out!