The Peach Orchard

Sometimes this joy 
is too much to hold.
It's like the peach trees  
in my grandmother's orchard
the summer I was 8. How they
let go that fullness.
How I ate. How I was filled. 

I'm the orchard tonight.
Someone wander by.

Good Things, Bad Things

Sometimes a good thing 
goes bad and sometimes 
a good-thing-gone-bad 
goes good and sometimes 
a good-thing-gone-bad-gone-good 
goes bad again. Of course, 
you are human, so you spin. 
You spin so fast, in fact, 
you may at times spin out into space.
And then you're kinda screwed,
or maybe you're unscrewed. Who knows?
Who knows where you'll come down 
or if you'll come down or ultimately, 
what it even is to come down.
You spin spin spin, then 
you slow slow slow till 
you're just an astronaut adrift,
floating way out there 
with nothing left to hold.
Nothing. Nothing. No thing.
No good thing gone bad.
No good. No bad. Just the 
same old now there ever was,
which now you see.

How Do We Know We are Good If No One Told Us We Were Loved?

We collapse into ourselves,
yet all the world would save us. 
Thunderstorms rip the sky
and cliffsides tumble free. 
Roots buckle roads. Cocoons burst.
Seedcoats dehisce and buds unclench. 
Listen, says the world, to live 
is to crack open.

Why Drinking a Latte is a Spiritual Act

Inside the cup 
is your latte.
Outside the cup 
is the universe.
Drink slowly. Savor. 
When you finish,
you refill your cup
from eternity.
So rich is the grind
of all being,
the barista makes
a mandala in the foam.