September

eleven

The Greenbrier River, where we spent last weekend in celebration of my husband’s birthday. The water was very low from the recent drought, but it was still beautiful.

When I woke up this morning and remembered what day it was, I decided that, as much as I am able, I would do everything with love today.  I filled the seed feeders with love, washed the bird bath and filled it with fresh water, keeping love in my heart. I spoke to the squirrel raiding the feeders in loving tones. I watered the garden with love, noting two ripened beefsteak tomatoes had been thoroughly ruined by sampling—probably by the Northern cardinals I’ve been watching dip in and out of the raised beds. I took Bonnie out for a turn around the house, letting love give her freedom to sniff every nook and cranny of the yard. I watered the flowering pots on the porch and in front of the garage with love, watched the slow sprinkle of water quench the thirsty.  I changed the nectar water in the hummingbird feeders with love, spoke to the female ruby-throated caressingly as she waited in the forsythia bush for me to bring her breakfast. I made the bed with love, poured the coffee with love, held my mouth in a posture of love when I spoke to my husband.

To listen to this post: (and Bonnie snoring in the background)

The world is abuzz with talk of last night’s debate and Taylor Swift’s presidential endorsement and hope, which is a good thing. But my heart wants quiet, to remember a time when we were all brought in close together—made one by grief and horror.

Today, I am thinking about the hole left in the world by the lost, but also all the bloom that has colored beauty into the places and the people they once touched. I don’t want to grow tired of remembering, bearing witness to the great gap left in our hearts and in the world on this one day. To move through the day in love requires this. It takes moving slow, attending to the small.  I cannot carry all the love that was scattered over the earth in wind and ash that day.

But I can try.

Every year on September 11, I read Brian Doyle’s essay, Leap. And I share this poem I wrote for a boy I used to know. Maybe one day I will write a new one. But this one still makes me cry a little, so I’ll stick with it for now.

For Paul:

we wandered into
an unkind forest
they left their gods
on the sidewalk with
shards of glass and metal,
ashen skin

you walk among the stars now
but I remember
a boy who rollerbladed between
the stacks—books 
on every side 

and that night
you danced until
your skin glistened...
death is not always followed
by more death

we finish our days
with a sigh,
pick our way through
the underbrush by 
the light of the moon

on the trees. moss grows
thick on stones and the fine
filigree of new grass is
soft on the ball of a foot.
your comet leaves a long
tail and I awaken 
with this word on my lips:

remember. remember.