ramblings of a feral heart

  i know a woman who once bit half way through her tongue.  inner tendrils of self preservation trusting the old wit: silence saves.   when i ask her why she does not speak now of then, her smile darkens into a callous.   (why doesn't matter anymore,) she shrugs.   her curved scar hides behind chaw-stained teeth; among divided taste buds. an ache joins us, quiet as a high tide.   her curled shoulder blades telegraph internal conflict.   she's reliving that moment.   then the tide goes out, and the ache scurries elsewhere. she asks me a memory.   (ever swallowed a mouthful of blood?)

  the woman who raised me is not much longer of earth.   i know that her physical body is passing away, without medical diagnosis, or familial confirmation.   the stories and patterns she and i share are my first informants.   a dear friend brings me a message from his dreamspace, where he saw my little mother swaying in a white embroidered dress by the warm seas of hawai'i.   he admits that he knew her by her feral loveliness, and i smile lopsidedly.   he tells me of the word she gave him.   patience. a wild rose bursts into bloom for the first time in years, after months of drinking up percolated coffee grounds, and water bowls of my own menstrual blood.   as i stare at the shock of magenta petals, a coastal wind whispers the words extinction burst to anyone listening.   fighting the grief in my throat, i whisper back blessings of peace and the unavoidable let-go. to create a medicine wheel in my wee...

  the reach is cosmic.   to reach for another being, matter, or idea is an instinct of existence.   to reach in want or need articulates a belief in difference of pattern or possibility.   a reach declares that  yes and no  are pivots of knowledge. are dandelions reaching out eagerly to share wishes? i recall the day his hands reached to betray my childish body, and i lost trust in touch, even my own. i consider the reach to fling the door open for a stranger;  the solemn reach of shaving a skull bare in mourning;  the reach to scoop an earthworm off of hot asphalt; and the reach of silence when words ain't around.   these opposable thumbs of mine mostly reach for book pages, embroidery needles, wild animals, spires of stinging nettles, half-drunk coffee cups, pilot pens and scrap notepaper, green rocks, and an egg-shaped salt shaker. every now and again, i find my hands in a hush, holding one another to etiquette or twid...