Winter Solstice

I’m intrigued by the Solstice. Though never officially diagnosed with Seasonal Affective Disorder, my endurance and warm disposition are tested by the short days we get here, just below the 45th north parallel. Jimmy Buffet said it best: tempers in need of repair.

We like our stories with arcs and twists, and our universe delivers by tilting the earth so that nothing is ever the same. When it’s winter solstice here, which usually means things are cold and wet, the sun is directly overhead along the Tropic of Capricorn, places like Sao Paulo and Brisbane. What to do if you’re both fundamentalist (which I’m not) and light-loving? Thou shalt not covet those savory UVs. But we can’t help it. We like the light and miss it. And we can’t wait for it to return. That goes for all of us, pagans and Christians and everyone else.

It’s a well-trodden fact that most Christmas symbols were borrowed from folks who lived well before the arrival of the Baby Jesus. And though there’s some compelling evidence his birthday was actually in the spring, there were (and are) a lot of compelling reasons to celebrate it on or near the solstice. The ancients were used to gathering then anyway. Stored food didn’t get any better if you waited a few weeks. There was still plenty of firewood, and the beer and wine created from the last harvest was just about ready. When it’s that cold, why not stay indoors and celebrate?

I looked into traditions of earlier peoples. Many cultures – too many to list here - performed solstice ceremonies. Many contained common threads: eating, drinking, storytelling, hooking up, setting things on fire. Their motivation? Probably a superstition that the declining light might not ever return unless we (humans, or the deities we asked) did an intervention.

The Mesopotamians may have come up with the earliest version of the 12 days of Christmas. Their 12 day festival of renewal was celebrated for the purpose of helping the god Marduk calm the monsters of chaos for one more year. Wanna bet that some form of monsters of chaos has probably been translated into all known languages? Or that Mardak had kindred spirits in other places?

It’s not difficult to see how many of our current traditions (unity, giving to others, candlelight, feasting, evergreens) are modern versions of what our ancestors did before we had rural electrification or office parties.

And what did they do? Wiccans burned Yule logs to encourage the return of the light and honor both life and death. Scandinavian families placed all of their shoes in one place, believing that this would cause them to live in harmony for the next year. Romans honored Bacchus by (what else?) drinking heavily during their festival of Brumalia. The Chacoans (ancestors of the modern Pueblo people of New Mexico) gathered at the Sun Dagger site of Chaco Canyon and danced the sun back into their days.

No Christmas letter from me, at least not here. I love this day because it represents a convergence of so many things I appreciate: light, enlightenment, physics, forgiveness, redemption, boundaries, friendships, hope. But today, mostly light. I hope the light is shining where you are.

I Imagined Stopping

We've had a few days of cold, enough for the water in the fountain to ice over and the roads to get slick. So be careful out there, okay?

Once I rounded the corner
saw your tail~lights through bluish steam
your tracks through drifting snow
halting at the aspens
I imagined stopping
to aim headlights at your bad luck
grabbing for a blanket
and hurdling toward your car

I heard my knuckles tapping
on your vapor covered window
hoping the only red I’d see is lipstick
that you’d still have all your life-signs
and my breathing could resume

These images I formed
because my mind's eye loathes a vacuum
I cannot picture blankness
when the story line’s unclear

I imagined stopping
while our narrative’s still forming
as our lives are intersecting
grateful I’ve got time to choose

Survivor

The Teen-in-Residence is reading Whitman for a school assignment, which led to questions about Meaning. I don't remember much about Whitman but do remember connections to nature and changing seasons. With temperatures dropping into the twenties, our season is changing here as well.


That last remaining leaf
on the windswept, proud pin oak
has earned my full respect

With her pluckiness and grit
I’m pulling for her
hoping she holds on tight
to the only life she knows

And when it’s time for her to leave
I hope it’s on her terms
that the fall to earth is gentle
her only sound a joyful noise

Office Hours

Not sure if I've ever posted this one before. My educator friends can all relate, it's something we've all been asked at one time or another...


When you asked me
if we covered anything important
I didn’t pause to wonder

I got into this work
because it’s all important

But since you asked
then yes
I imagine we did

We watched a bootleg copy of King’s I have a dream speech
took turns playing Vivaldi on the Stradivarius
correctly calculated the date of the rapture
made routine repairs to the space station
hosted a gymnastics team from Sweden
brokered a peace deal in Palestine
isolated the gene for breast cancer
produced an Oscar-winning film
blew up some shit in Chemistry
solved Fermat’s Last Theorem
created a masterpiece in oil

And did some prep for the final

Missed you

Things that could have stopped me

A normal childhood
without pharmacology

Never learned Latin

My parents stayed together

Don’t own a tweed jacket

The voices inside my head encourage
but never scream

Incessant cries of the breakfast flock

Living in countries
where poets are killed

Time changes and the dark seasons

Red pen within

Celebration of Clay Art

This evening, I will have the good fortune of co-hosting an event commemorating a new collection of rare and valuable Northwest ceramic art. Every meaningful event in life deserves a poem...

Earth, long before us
alive, now and forever
today, source of joy


.

Narratives From Her Return

In loops reminiscent of planetary arcs
she’d sail to the far corners of the earth
then return for some respite and a soft, clean bed

While there
as here
she lit up doorways and gained favor
by learning the ancient greetings of her hosts
peering into their worlds through newly borrowed words

Once home, she’d unpack new stories
of long hikes, throbbing feet
and close calls
each one starting with a greeting of place

From the cabbie in Guangzhou
Have you eaten?

The warriors of Masai
How are the children?

In the rarified air of Bhutan
Is your body well?

And my favorite
from the Twi of Ghana
How is your soul perceiving the world?