Many Rooms

She understood
The many rooms in Father's house
Did not make a mansion
The many rooms were an omen.

Walking through the rooms 
Was a different journey each time
Different people, furnishings,
Books, memorabilia, all different.

At first she found the dreams unsettling
But over time she willed herself
To stay with the dreams
As if she were visiting someone.

She learned to walk slowly
To look at the pictures on the walls
The books on the shelves
And the trinkets on the tables.

She learned to pay attention 
To the people in the rooms
Most importantly to the person
Who wandered from room to room.

The house itself never varied, 
Only the things in the house changed.
They documented a life lived.
They told a story.

John had gone on ahead
To prepare a place
For the one who wandered.
And she was watching.

Morocco

A flight to Casablanca and on to Fez.
A driver leaves my daughter and her
Companions outside a hotel at 3am.
Blonde hair, blue eyes, so little Arabic.

The promised plans do not materialize.
This is not only culture shock,
It becomes a fight for survival
Where to stay, where to get food.

I was frustrated having to take home ec
When I wanted to take shop instead
This was before Title IX, before Ms.,
or Sally Ride,  or Sandra Day O'Connor.

"I can't do this," she says.  "I'm coming home."
I panic.  She is strong-willed enough
To try to strike out on her own
In this rugged desert country.

She grew up mucking in ponds
Taking karate lessons, using tools.
She has never known fear,
Racial or gender discrimination.

So much has changed from
My mother's generation to mine
To hers, that has brought her
To this place in Morocco.

She was so excited we let her go.
We did not let her go.
We only held our fears still, and
Made sure she found food in Morocco.

Midnight River

No one understood how deep the darkness was. 
This darkness was not the redeeming darkness of night.   
It was a darkness that crept across the page, between words. 

River water ran through her blood.
It renewed her soul, flowing both deep and muddy
in places, and rippling with sparkles in others.  
She looked for redemption in these waters of contrast.   
She tried to let water wash the darkness away but it was too heavy.  
Words and water alone were not enough this time. 
This was a darkness she fought with everything she had.

The road she followed was not others’ road. 
Hers was a solitary journey, of discovery, of quietude. 
She stood for moments in silence, just breathing,
absorbing the energy and history people left behind.
It’s what made places holy.

She wanted to fly. 
To spread her arms and take flight,
bending her fingertips to catch the breeze and glide,
to follow her heart without blinking,  
to feel weightless again, but open cage doors

are of no use to a bird with a broken wing.
Though glass birds sparkle in the sun, they shatter when they fall.

She knew some paths were meant to be lit by the sun
while other paths were better lit by the moon and stars.

Moonlight changed her when she breathed it in. 
It seeped into her veins and silvered her soul,
awakening her anew to the wonders of night,
helping her see things she couldn’t,
helping her understand things she didn’t.

She inhaled the night like a bouquet,  
Taking comfort in landscapes darkness hid, 
 glaring imperfections of a man-made world
overtaken by soft purple shadows of dusk
and even softer grays of moonlight.  

She wondered what was out there.
Nervous but aching to fly. 
Because when she felt the wind in her face,
she could see, she could create, she could be.

She looked for rain to wash down on her,
baptize her soul with color.
So she would always have an artist’s eye,
a musician’s ear, a poet’s soul.

Her poet's voice urged her to write,
inner fears held her back.

Voices within argued over her pen.
She wrestled between opening her heart
and keeping it safely closed, protected.

Allowing herself to be loved was so much work.
She wished she did not understand...
   - what it felt like when a heart stops beating
   - that love cannot conquer everything
   - that the night does not hide everything
   - that she could not fly like a bird.