Red Delicious Vedanta

~ Deb ~ 1 Comment 
Once upon a random
time, there was an apple
hanging by its stem from
a tree, an apple tree,
of course. It was one 
with the tree but also had
an awkward but compelling 
sense of individuality.

“I am one of many apples,”
it thought, because apples may
be able to think — who really
knows? “But I am special, 
unique, and different. I can feel
it. There is more for me to do
then just hang from this tree.” 

And one day, sure enough, the
sticky stuff holding the stem to 
the tree let go, and the apple 
fell to the ground. 

How exhilarating! 

Not even a parachute or a
fireman’s net to break the
fall. Just an abrupt and
dramatic entrance into a 
whole new life. 

“Ah,” thought the apple. “Now
life can really begin.” And it was
a true shame apples have no 
palms to rub together, or ours
would have. 

And so the apple waited. Other
apples were gently picked by the
orchard workers.  Some had fallen
to the ground as our apple had and 
were tossed into the bruised basket
headed for the cider mill.  But our
apple had tumbled into the tall grass
near the fence line, unseen by 
people or even deer.  

“Surely,” thought the apple, “something
grand will happen soon, something
special, unique, and different just like
me.” But days passed and nothing
happened. 

Our apple started to rot and soon
ants were crawling over it so
disrespectfully.  The red skin turned
a deep and putrid auburn. The white
insides began to age into
brown. 

“I so wanted to be unique,” said the
apple, “and here I am nothing but 
rotting flesh. Oh, how I wish I had 
stayed one with the tree.” The 
apple looked up and saw the orchard
limbs bare. All of the apples and
pears and persimmons had been
plucked or had fallen. 

“I am not one with the tree, and
perhaps I never was,” our apple
opined.  Disappointment caused 
rot to come even more quickly. 
Fall became winter.  Snow covered
the apple, which was now not much
more than a stem and a few
seeds. 

When spring thawed the ground, the
apple awakened from its hibernation, 
for apples are related to bears and 
hedgehogs and bumblebees and humans —
all other beings who spend long stretches 
asleep.  The apple felt different. 
It felt green and new. The apple
patted itself down like a sleepwalker
checking for awakeness and discovered
that a seed had taken root.  It was
becoming a tree, one that would 
someday give birth to apples. 

And finally the apple knew —
It was never one with the tree;
it was one with the earth. 
As apple, as seed, as tree —
one with the mother of us 
all.

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.