My mother used to water our back garden Wearing nothing but her Mormon underwear And she bought the sheer silky kind Not the thick cotton. What goes on in the temple Is not secret, it’s sacred say the Mormons and I Believe them. An apostate child for twenty years And I have never looked up the endowment Ceremony online. But I know all about the underwear From my mom’s summer gardening habits and From when I had to gather them up and put them In a plastic reusable grocery bag for her friend To dispose of in a sacred way after she died.
I saw her temple clothes too when I went with her Church ladies to dress her body before she Met the fire. The people who had retrieved her body From the board and care left her in her gown And half open diaper. When we opened the bag her Mouth was open like she was begging for my help. I tried to focus on her peeling bare feet Only on her feet but my eyes kept reaching for her In her face and my ears for the silent scream.
I had to leave the room and let her faith friends Finish. This was not their first body. Not by a long shot. All near my mom’s age themselves I wondered if They wondered who would be gowning them Or if their mortuary would collect them in a more Dignified way. For their sakes, I hoped so.
They are clever. I wondered how exactly you Get a floor length temple dress on a dead body. The trick Is you cut it up the back and down the seams Of the sleeves. You lay the dress on and tuck it around. Mormon beehive ingenuity and industriousness Is something I have always admired.
And the courage. Those women’s courage.
When they were finished they called me back Into the room, pulled the cover from her face And said, “Isn’t she pretty?” She was wearing Her veil, white dress, green apron. Blessedly They had closed her terrified mouth.
She was pretty.
Light in her hair Hose in her hand Watering the red hibiscus In her silky sacred garments Watching a hummingbird Wings nearly invisible Dart in and out of the spray.
In direct Buddha lineage Name chanted reverently What of his mother? Was she the Earth-dirt body Flesh of his own body He had to overcome? John-sweat on his infant skin The suffering that took twelve Wheels turning to overturn? How long must he have been Sitting before he realized He could not un-cling to pain For her? But only For himself let go of her Whore’s weeping held Storming in his mind?
I sit efforting my eyes to stay Down and unfocused the smell Of john-sweat rises to my nose The grimacing gatekeeper of I might give birth to a roshi Back screaming in this broken chair Sitting straighter than shame Knees spread wide Hands an open oval Over my womb
The first cry Sweaty mother and destiny Kissed child is a relief The cord is cut the un-clinging Begun —a tiny red fist Opening unnaturally Separation sustained And dissolved Son of prostitute becomes Prostitute becomes her son Becomes a single drop of blood Mixed on the scroll chanted reverently Direct lineage of the Buddha.
My god a raft Naked lazy backstroke Beneath me water Washing over his chest I lie back Under my back The veil Clear and sweet I feel his muscles work Droplets on my lips As each arm Raises and lowers Behind us Honey sweet Drought-rain sweet Crisp the veil My dewy face His heartbeat Never not water enough For god to swim in Never a pleasure veil Thinner than this Rapid flood trickle The stroke Backward Nude Feet last Easy
Divine stereo listening with my eyes Closed in the sweet spot under the patio Not far from the hanging seed The crows confabulate in a Narrowing circle above my head The orange-breasted robins on the left and Plain brown wrens quarrel in the dense Mock oranges the gardener recently chopped The tops of making less space and more rancor. From somewhere on the right a bossy bluejay gets Off his feathery duff and regulates—loudly.
I sit so still a fat white dove comes to the feeder within Two arms’ reach and clicks seeds into his beak The sound of raindrops spitting against glass. My eyes are closed but I know he is fat because I have been Feeding my backyard aviary heartily—because his wing beats are Heavy when he flies away—and because the plastic feeder swings And squeaks on its rusty hook in his absence.
I know he is pure white because My imagination tells me so.
A too-warm-for-early-March breeze sidles In from the East—the one wind whose name I don’t know—and plays a single note on the Copper wind chime to my right before touching My hand the way a virgin who wants A lover with his whole body is only brave enough To suggest hand-holding One soft pinky tip to another.
The no-name virgin god-wind and all the bawdy Many-named and sun-shining gods and all the white And black and blue and brown and orange birds
And the magenta hibiscus—the coral The gold, the scarlet
And the topaz pool The empty terracotta pots All the cement the color of cement
Nothing separate—color, sound, Birds, flesh, wind. One Pulsing lover and beloved
And gratitude—the snake Who worships and adores his own tail His eyes half bliss slits as he consumes it Whole—too sweet for venom or bite And ever expanding this tail as it moves Through his body passing each one of his Seven humming hearts, emerging from Him longer and more glorious than before Expanding the circle endlessly Scale by glistening scale.
Seed by seed Petal by petal Feather by feather Melody by melody Ear by ear Both eyes closed.
My trick is a little garlic salt in the boiling water
My husband calls that the love
Garlic salt is my trick for everything holy in our food
My husband says it’s the love
Casino is playing in the family room
On our tiny television in the giant entertainment center
My mother bought thirty years ago when furniture
Was still real and heavy
One day I will get rid of it so we can have
A bigger TV, but today the little TV is enough
And I don’t mind the behemoth it sits in with
All my mother’s tchotchkes in the glass-doored
Cabinets and her ashes in a wooden urn on the corner shelf
The f-bombs from Casino float into the kitchen where
I am about to drain the garlic salt water pasta and
In my mind, I sing along with Joe Pesci as they come
My favorite movie, this scene one of my favorite songs
My husband and I appreciate vociferously his breath control
I drain the pasta and the salty steam rises to give me a much needed
Pore cleanser before billowing out of the open kitchen window
Into the twilight of a cool Southern California autumn that waited
Until mid-November to come but, blessedly, did come
I stop with the hot pasta strainer in both hands
Everything.
Everything.
Everything
Is perfect
Just as it is
The Goddess of All-That-Is
Has passed by my window
Come in through the open back door
Patted my poodle’s curly-topped head as she entered
Swayed into the kitchen
Stood beside me at the sink
Rustled her moonlight robes just enough so
That I could smell her whole dusky body
And her celestial perfume.
It smells like garlic salt, autumn, boxed pasta
Heavy wood, ashes, jarred sauce,
My husband’s day old Old Spice, puppy dog
And love
-M. Ashley
I am studying both Taoism and Zen Buddhism. In one of my Taoist readers for today, the author talks about how Taoists read and write poetry. That gave me a little kick in the butt to get back to it. And especially in a way that honors one of the strongest Is-ness or Flow or Tao moments I have ever had. The words still aren’t quite getting it, but it is a pleasure to try.
As if the merry current weren’t worthy As if anguish were worthy
I flail against it Take in great gulps Muscles give out Lungs fill up I go under surely The last time then rise Flailing harder
I end up downstream anyway The merry current is still merry
-M. Ashley
I have been studying Taoism which seems so natural to me and so lighthearted. Then I started flirting with Zen Buddhism which, by comparison, is difficult and austere. In meditation today it tickled me how this pattern shows up over and over again in my life: When something is easy and natural, I’m quick to toss it away because surely something that loverly can’t be truly valuable! I must SUFFER! I’m not sure if that’s a Puritanical echo or what, but such nonsense! The merry current is still merry and I end up downstream anyway. Why not relax and enjoy the flow?
M. N. Ashley 