Ants

Have you bent low to see
ants labor in their daily toil
while we live and work and play with guns?

Their industry is joy.
Each to the whole, they work as one,
particular and necessary.

Ask: is every action
essential, nothing secondary,
as they tunnel through the soil?

***

As they tunnel through the soil,
essential, nothing secondary -
ask: is every action

particular and necessary?
Each to the whole, they work as one,
their industry is joy.

While we live and work and play with guns,
ants labor in their daily toil.
Have you bent low to see?



This poem was inspired by Natasha Trethewey's incredible Myth, from Native Guard. I was fascinated with the way the lines inverted themselves in the second half of the poem, changing their meaning - like walking a labyrinth. Jessica at 9 to 5 Poet did the same thing with Through the Looking Glass, and I knew I had to try my hand as well. I changed the rhyme scheme to be a little more subtle, and don't think I achieved the same inversion of meaning that Trethewey accomplished... but it is still one of my favorite poems I have written. I'm pleased with it.

If you would be at peace...

It helps to find beauty in simple things.
In daily life is the joy we seek. Here,
in our expanse and not our lessenings,

in the unprotected margins, we are
made whole through our own imperfection.
In daily life, the joy we seek is here:

the lover’s touch, the child’s smile. Connections
weave the cloth of which serenity is
made. Wholly through our own imperfection

we admit the divine - such blessings
with abandon gather. Your faith within
weaves the cloth of which serenity is,

luminous and bright. This is how we begin
to touch the sacred. Heart of God! To love
with abandon, gather your faith. Within

your grasp is grace. Do not rebuff
its help: to find beauty in simple things,
to touch the sacred heart of God, to love
in our expanse and not our lessenings.

BEACHCOMBING

Landbound, I dream of the coast:
The kiss of salt on my lips, the bite of sun on my cheeks,
Roiling surf seducing me, caressing me,
depositing one perfect whelk at my feet.
Anne Morrow Lindbergh promised me a gift from the sea.

So we go.

The beaches are quieter, early in the morning,
before the crest of the heat and the swell of the crowds.
We share the shoreline with a large Amish family.
Incongruous: the girl-children dance in the waves
in their blue and purple dresses.

No whelks or sand-dollars are to be found;
Nothing glamorous and fine.
Only mussels, black and glistening,
a few broken quahogs,
irregular oysters,
and the occasional shattered slipper.

I gather them anyway.
Rinsing off the sand,
turning them in my hands,
laying them gently in an orange pail.
Each of these was created by God
and lived out its life with dignity.
May the same be said for me.