If Only

If I had known how much I would miss
The people in the ether
The incorporeal ones that I love
I would have named children and pets and cars and trees
For them
Sung their names on the wind
Called the dog Floyd
Named the girl Joan
Spoken them into my life each and every day to keep
them present and part
of us and threaded through
All that we do as a quiet benediction
A nod to love
An affirmation of the people who
were my person

If I had known.

BL 12.27.15

Rosary

This one goes out to my ladies, near and far. Now I'm grinning, because in my head, I sounded like Barry White when I typed that. 

I gather you in, your strength, your positive thoughts and vibes - you. I think these days roll by and we hurry and scurry, and I think maybe I forget to tell you I care. Then I read a bit of a writing by someone like Rachel Lewis, and it burns me with its direct beauty. 

*******************************************************************************************************

I count you on my fingers

One digit for each

You are my soul sisters

and I am saying lucky

with each name I recite

lucky lucky lucky

Lucky we found each other

lucky lucky lucky

Lucky our hearts knit

I breathe your name

I call up your essence in my head

In times of need

You are comfort, you are calm

On days of challenge

You are rage, you’ve got my back

Like saints I whisper you into being

Conjure you with a memory

You are my rosary

My consolation in days of dread

Blood’s got nothin’ on soul

BL

5.29.14

Sunday Note: Substance

substance (noun): the quality of being meaningful, useful, or important

Come to me with your substance

Let me hear your words

Let your worth be a banner

Let all manner of tomfoolery

be underlaid with meaning

Let us laugh and then share one of those moments

Where silence can indeed say it all

Silence and a falling teardrop

caressing your cheek

and singing the song of love

Carrying in its path the tale of war wounds

and broken hearts

and hearts that keep on living.

The substance of tears

may just be the substance of soul

Set free for the short journey

You could catch it with your tongue

and carry that soul within

Or just let it soak back into the ground

substance matter mass

You are always with us.

Changing form

Carrying on.

BL

12.1.13

All will be well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well.

Sunday Note: What Lies Beneath

Some nights I sleep
on the edge of sleep
and I miss someone I once was
I sleep and wake
drift and rise
A tear glistens and I am confused
lonesome
Then stolen away again
I think I am traveling and my spirit goes
and goes
But my mind can't fathom
and so it befuddles and soothes
and accepts the twilight journey
But in the morning light I feel shadows
I feel I have drifted
I long for a place that is
not
of
this
world
And I long for the sleep to cradle
and mistrust
But mostly I long to know
Where I have come from.

BL
11/3/13

I decided in the morning that if I miss who I was, then I will be her again. Here comes The Sunday Note again. I'm back. 

Knowing where you've come from

Shine that light
Shine it out proud
I chime daily and daily
checking my own bushel for a light hidden
underneath it
Hear my words
lodge them in your heart
Carry them along, decades from here
I know they'll sink in
like soft weights, anchors, oh soul
or pointed barbs if I've not gone careful
but sink they will
And on the day
you say them in the heat of a moment
The hooks are in good
I'll know my job was done
It's only when we spout out to our own
that we know something for sure
That we know who we are
where we've come from
"You've come a long way, Bethy Lee."

BL
9/22/13

This one's for my Nanny - great-grandmother Annie Mae Harrell - who loved me a long time, lodged some simple words in my heart, and fed me up with soul food of the original kind. I know where I came from Nanny, and you're right - it was a long way. :)

In February

February is a thin-skinned month

pebbles bruise and

slide under my skin

The month in which I lost

my father

and almost lost myself

The month I realized

I was a borderland girl

as I wandered this world

and the next

seeking the lost one.

In February the pebbles tear my skin

never bouncing off harmlessly

In February I learned to grieve.

These years later emotional memory,

muscle memory rises, has imprinted,

still blindsiding me

still forming

the daddy-shaped piece of my puzzle

I’m still wandering the borderland

still searching for that piece.

Whether I realize it

or not.

BL 

2/10/13