nearly (a love note)

when I am not near
let this hold the space,
she said.
let these lines
be the signs
that point you back to
this place…
and I noticed how
the word “place”
entered the air,
just as her hand
came to land
on her heart.

daylight savings

of all the things
we could speak of now
there is this:
the clocks, about to change,
the light, about to leave the sky,
the music…
riding on the static
from the station we hardly get
but keep trying.
and you,
in the other room,
about to appear,
on your way to check
the soup,
the stew,
the simmering thing
we will eat
in just a short while.
but for now
(oh! for now …)
i am in love
with what is happening
right now…
that melody,
these smells,
your smile I know is there,
because we love this song,
we love this light.

in one breath

wanting
to believe herself capable
and ready made
and appropriate for any situation
she closed her eyes,
and watched
as the entire catalog of available thoughts
came forward,
like the circling arms of a Ferris wheel,
each one a mid-air basket:
heavy
dangling
dangerous.

daily

This one came quickly, in a  free-write during a songwriting workshop with Bernice Lewis this week, in Whitefield, NH.  She had been talking about the necessity of honing one’s artistic practice, by supporting it with an ongoing spiritual practice.  The key here being, practice.  I’ve decided this is the winter I learn to play the guitar.  And pick up the writing again, with devoted hands.

 

devoted.  i am newly devoted
to finding out the
what and how of how to do
the now.
delighted, i am waking into
praying every morning, with my body,
with my bending over to the ground
the ground beneath my breaking open
of letting go of wallow
i am swallowing it whole
a whole new now way
to enter into day.

devoted.  i am newly devoted

to finding out the

what and how of how to do

the now.

delighted, i am waking into

praying every morning, with my body,

with my bending over to the ground

the ground beneath my breaking open

of letting go of wallow

i am swallowing it whole

a whole new now way

to enter into day.

songs from another noon (day one)

photo by Sini Haapalinna of a photo by Daido Moriyama

i have a photograph of a photograph.
one moment in time, twice removed…
the first thing i notice is the way perspective
makes all lines meet in the end…
and of course, the way the light
meets the fog meets the air.
this is the glow we all want-
like the luminous promise
the horizon hands out twice a day.

sepia always sings of things
gone long time out of reach.

there are words written
along the length of these tracks
it’s just if you want to read them,
you have to stand in the way of the train.
or give up the solid and crushable human form,
become something else…
transparent and permeable.

*
her face is fading from me
moving, without sound,
away from the station
pulling away on the overnight train.

*

sometimes the world comes so clearly,
like a film, with lines for all the players:
tracks say: i have to go now…
telephone wires: i am tracing the way you leave…
train says: i carry the heartache, the hope, back and forth
and the station, (the station being a metaphor for itself)
the station has no need for words,
having so many times been home
to these endless human stories.

*

like waking from a dream
where your hands were full
of all the things
you don’t get to keep

walk the long length out of town,
tight-roping the quiet tracks
into the point where things disappear
into the empty of open hands…

© Katherine Ferrier 2008

how we share the sky (day seven)

This week of posts are inspired by a collaborative project initiated by an artist friend of mine who’s currently in grad school. The instructions I received were simply, once a day for the next seven days, to 1) show a part of my sky (something visual) and then 2) share something of myself (something textual). Each in our own locations, we will be doing this daily practice, recording the time and date of each piece and at the end of the seven days, exchanging what we have.

photo by katherine ferrier

up or down, north or south:
i’m telling you, there’s more than this.

we move in all directions.

shake out the prayer rugs!
lean dangerous through the space
where the window will be…

© Katherine Ferrier 2008

how we share the sky (day six)

This week of posts are inspired by a collaborative project initiated by an artist friend of mine who’s currently in grad school. The instructions I received were simply, once a day for the next seven days, to 1) show a part of my sky (something visual) and then 2) share something of myself (something textual). Each in our own locations, we will be doing this daily practice, recording the time and date of each piece and at the end of the seven days, exchanging what we have.

photo by katherine ferrier

tiny song at sunset goes:
look how much it takes
to stay in touch
to cross the line
to draw the space
to fill the air
to find the ways to send the words

when you stand near me,
we make parallel lines
up from the ground.
throwing our signals long into the air,
long into the distance.
we tangle for the speed of light, the perfect hit-
we settle for proximity.

in this lifetime, at least, we sing
move closer, dear
move closer to me
let me hear your speeding heart
let’s hum into the morning…

© Katherine Ferrier 2008

how we share the sky (day five)

This week of posts are inspired by a collaborative project initiated by an artist friend of mine who’s currently in grad school. The instructions I received were simply, once a day for the next seven days, to 1) show a part of my sky (something visual) and then 2) share something of myself (something textual). Each in our own locations, we will be doing this daily practice, recording the time and date of each piece and at the end of the seven days, exchanging what we have.

photo by katherine ferrier

i’ve been wanting to ask you:
may we also speak of things that fall?
we can’t use the word sky
without thinking the word ground.
everything that is
also holds its opposite.

if i show you my sky,
i must also show you the things that fell from it.
things shot down, ripped from the air,
pulled apart, feather by feather…

maybe there are two kinds of people
tell me, then…which one are you?
when you hear the word sky…
which word follows quicker…
fly…or fall…?

look up now. look down.
spend your life looking
in every direction.

© Katherine Ferrier 2008

how we share the sky (day four)

This week of posts are inspired by a collaborative project initiated by an artist friend of mine who’s currently in grad school. The instructions I received were simply, once a day for the next seven days, to 1) show a part of my sky (something visual) and then 2) share something of myself (something textual). Each in our own locations, we will be doing this daily practice, recording the time and date of each piece and at the end of the seven days, exchanging what we have.

photo by katherine ferrier

i didn’t mean to make it fancy.
i wasn’t trying for metaphor…
i only wanted to show you

something of the quiet way
the leaves had light around their edges.
something about the trees
around the border of the yard…
how they made a patient frame.

stillness, dear…
i was trying to show you stillness.

thought i was looking
at some quiet backyard breathing.

i didn’t plan on finding
white-fire orbits,
spinning holy in the backyard…

who is ever ready for the shock of angels?

© Katherine Ferrier 2008

how we share the sky (day three)

This week of posts are inspired by a collaborative project initiated by an artist friend of mine who’s currently in grad school. The instructions I received were simply, once a day for the next seven days, to 1) show a part of my sky (something visual) and then 2) share something of myself (something textual). Each in our own locations, we will be doing this daily practice, recording the time and date of each piece and at the end of the seven days, exchanging what we have.

photo by katherine ferrier

it was cold today-
the way cold can be
when it first comes back.
and i thought to myself,
(on the boylan heights bridge
the tracks below, heading away from town
through the nearly end of day kind of light,
there already, sooner than i wanted…)

i thought to myself, here we go…
time, again, for sweaters and hats
time, again, for prayer.

© Katherine Ferrier 2008