Ode to the Community Pool

~ Deb ~ Leave a comment 
In the water, I am
12 again.  Or maybe 25
or 40, but younger. 
Definitely younger. 

I float in weightlessness,
my face just above the
surface.  My head tilts
to the right, and the water 
is at my eye, lapping at
the lashes, rising and
falling against my cheek,
the recognition of an old
friend. 

I tilt my head back until 
only the blowhole of my 
mouth feels the breeze. I take
a breath and sink, turn,
glide, rest my tummy on the
bottom, twirl again with rudder
arms and duck paddle feet, 
look up at filtered sun, 
remembering the summers 
of childhood, diving 
for pennies, rocking 
the inner tube, 
handstands. 

Water remembers. Water feels
what I have known, where I have
been.  It is an intimate friend,
welcoming me back, holding
me up, carrying so much of
the weight of me.

The Rapids

~ Deb ~ Leave a comment 
At times I feel poetry with
no words. Feelings whitewater
through me with the scent of purpose.
Memories crash against the banks 
of an unexplored river looking 
for their level, promising to be 
tamed by language if they can
get still. 

Titanic movements swell inside
with a seaspray of hints at
profundity.  My life will be 
forever changed if this water
falls into vocabulary.  

So I paddle on, still believing.
Still believing.  
Still believing.

I try to say “Happy Fourth!”

~ Deb ~ 2 Comments 
and it sticks in my throat like a primal 
blockage that wants to give
way but can’t. 

The people of this beautiful land are
loving and generous and kind, for
the most part, but also angry and 
hateful, exclusionary, and possessive 
of the wealth of freedom they think 
they have. 

They came as immigrants, then 
ignored those already
here, like this sentence does. 
They came as immigrants, then
opposed those who would follow,
closing doors once held open for the 
yearning masses.

Not all, of course, and celebrations
demand a focus on the praiseworthy —
the stands taken for democracy, the
opportunities offered to outgrow our
selves, the social safety net we 
knit from strands of compassion and
a deep-seated aversion to sullying 
our beautiful lives with visions of 
poverty. 

She gives with one hand and takes 
away with the other, my motherland.
She preaches a hoarded freedom,
this limited paradise of promise.  
She offers crumbs from the table
as if that should ease our craving.

But I am she.  And you. And you. And
The immigrant. And the Cherokee. And
the Irish seeking relief from impoverished 
hunger. And the African seeking the
freedom stolen from them. 
And the Jew seeking life un-threatened. 
And the Palestinian seeking life un-threatened. 
And the Sudanese seeking
peace. And the Hindu and the 
Muslim and the Chinese and the
Ukrainian and the Serb and the 
Mexican and the fullness of the
human experience on this planet
that is home to us all.  

Mine is the patriotism of humanity, 
fueled by a democratic compassion,
honoring the republic that makes
us one. Let freedom ring.


Bully Pulpit

~ Deb ~ 4 Comments 
In Sunday School,
I learned that a 
person could live 
inside the belly of
a great fish for
three whole days

And a boat could 
be built that would
hold two of every
creature ever born
plus a family of
eight

And that a barely
pubescent shepherd
could slay a giant 
with a slingshot
and a well-aimed
stone.

And the Jesus
we heard about
fed people and 
welcomed children and
told stories about
kind strangers who
cared for others

And he talked 
about mercy and 
he talked about hope
and he talked about 
loving one another,
not as good ideas, but
as the essence of
righteousness. 

And how the ones
who taught me that
became advocates for
a theology of meanness,
mouthpieces for a
politics of hate,
soldiers in an army
of exclusion,
is a kind of reverse-
miracle I’ll never
understand.