Trust in the Turning

I trust in the old stories: how they swivel like a fist in the dough, a spoon in the bowl, the wrist wrenching a flower from the hard ground, the deep, dank opening toward winter.

Persephone: mother, daughter, suitor, sweet red seed. Next: Agios Stylianos, early to the party, a swaddled baby in his arms. Then, Santa and Rudolph, the dream team: brilliant light, gift of flight.

Mary and Jesus. Jesus and Mary. Joseph the sideliner, watcher, worrier. Mother, son, deep red seed.

Agios Stephanos with his loukoumades. Agios Basilis with his sweet, moneyed bread. Epiphany: watery unveiling, the house blessed for the new year.

Koliva: boiled wheat, white sugar, tiny red seeds.

When Spring returns, she's a prodigal, a dancer, dragging her lush, green skirt. Then Summer. Then Autumn, with its reddening leaves, its whole red fruit.

Then winter, again. Darkness, waiting, cold white shawl, candles for sustenance and warmth.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Mary Oliver's "Goldenrod"

In her poem "Goldenrod," Mary Oliver begins: "On roadsides, in fall fields, in rumpy bunches, saffron and orange and pale gold, in little towers, soft as mash, sneeze-bringers and seed-bearers, full of bees sand yellow beads and perfect flowerlets and orange butterflies." I love the phrase "rumpy bunches." That was the phrase that caused me to remember what goldenrod looked like. Hiking the prairie, the goldenrod are the yellow plants that seem to gather and bend together, old women, golden-headed instead of gray, whispering their secrets. They stink, and they are rugged and disheveled, but they are also beautiful in their own way. I loved the prairie from the moment I moved here, but I learned to love it more because of S, who was so in awe of living in the midst of so much open space when I first got her. She loved to walk with me, noticing plant and snake and bird, breathing in, in, in. Later, walking ...
Read more

Song for Autumn

"In the deep fall/don't you imagine the leaves think how/comfortable it will be to touch the earth instead of the/nothingness of air and the endless/freshets of wind?" Mary Oliver writes in "Song for Autumn." What does it mean to live a good life, to have a good death? A mentor of mine died a good death recently, loved deeply by so many who visited regularly until the very end. I never went to see him, even though S asked many times that we do so. I had heard from a mutual friend that he'd said, "Let them come if they need to say goodbye," and I didn't. I didn't because the last time I saw him, he had hugged me tightly and told me how glad he was to have worked with me, and I had said the same. We both knew, of course, that he was dying, but in that moment, surrounded by the noise and laughter at a community meal, we didn't have to say it. Before then, S and I had presented him with a painting of his favorite local hang out at his retir...
Read more

SOFA at Our Home!

  To: All-Employees RE: SOFA at our home! We’re THRILLED to be hosting SOFA, the weekly end of week party that travels from home to home, for the first time in many years! If you remember the last time I hosted, please don’t hold that against me (or my spouse, whom I didn't even know at the time)–that was a long time ago! Anyway, we wanted to give you some information about our home to prepare you for what we hope will be an amazing party! We’ve broken this invitation into sections for ease of navigating. Please read them all, even if you don’t think they pertain to you. What You Should Know About Our Vibe Before you enter our home, we’ll be asking you what Zone you’re in, and what your plans are to get back into the Green Zone if you report being in blue, yellow, or (God forbid) red.  Please provide your own fidget and coping cards so you can stay in the Green Zone, because no one at our home is going to share theirs. We will be checking in with you at least once an hour abou...
Read more