cocoon
the pressure from the
black cocoon cracks
i am free,
sprouted
with wings
//
rosmarie has transitioned
to the new world
she’s the elder i care give for
& she’s ready to transition
//
the tv is on
as i brush rosmarie’s silver
hair
it falling & catching on the
comb
she asks me to put her
hair outside
for the birds to build
their nests
imagine transitioning &
still thinking of the birds
//
while i’m bringing rosmarie tea
her body frail & bedridden
with a spirit strength
the tv talks about young buddhist
monks
hoping to escape the
cycle of life & death
when i take rosmarie to the bathroom,
with her partner fritz, we take her
from the bed to the wheelchair to
the toilet
fritz wheels her into the bathroom &
i lift her — all of her — in my arms
for a few moments
as she’s in the air, fritz says “don’t drop
her”
it feels like holding two lives at once
i’m usually on the other side of the
circle of life
//
holding babies or toddlers, walking or
driving 10-year-olds to school, pushing
strollers through dappled sunlight
the pilli, the children are full of potential
this is the same & different
giving care, bottles, changing diapers, changing clothes, cooking but on the other side of life,
if there are sides to the circle
as i do the dishes or cook, i utter
prayers
prayers of healing, prayers of love
sometimes i think of how much
this society — the dominant society
of that myth called america
— fails its people
how we should have community on turtle
island — access to tonantzin tlalli — the
earth, our mother
how in truth we live in a world
of abundance
how lack is manufactured
in the kitchen, fritz is watching
cnn
the anchor is going on about how
fish are swimming in circles then
dying, “baffling scientists”
i bet it is, i mutter under my breath
something about neurotoxins
it reminds me of what violet
said — that animals were offering
themselves to help the human collective
it reminds me of the indigenous
prophecy that the poles would switch
ollin — great movements of energy
as the world ends & begins
“every single day, i can go out & see
the fish struggling & spinning & dying,”
one scientist says
i feel the same way about people
//
in danza, we spin to the huēhuētl,
the beat of the drum, the song of
the cosmos
i was spinning entering
danza
spinning
from being plucked, or maybe
falling — from another world
spinning
from the tongues cut from
my mouth
that i
recover
— three at least —
spanish
arabic
nahuatl
spinning
from the disorientation of an
old world aflame
an old world dying
palestinian
child
limbs
splashed across screens
next to ads & recipes &
contouring
la vida es sagrada
toda vida es sagrada
spinning
from housing insecurity
from a stomach too
tight with stress to eat
spinning from homophobia
at supposed home
spinning from the homeless
encampments
which only grow
until they are cleaned
it’s always the word
cleansing
for violence done to the
people
spinning from the freeway
taken to danza
the 210
to the 605
to the 60
the concrete over tongva land
grey, covering wildflower &
memory
covering blood, water, vida
but not erasing it
just layering ugly
over beauty
to try to have us forget
our true nature
— our divine nature—
that we are
the wildflowers
we are the birds
& their call
we are ilhuicatl, the heavens
as they open & sing
as the clouds
shift in each moment of each day,
light & color & form
we are the fire
& we are the water
& we are the wind
& we are the earth, tonantzin
tlalli, tonantzin coatlique
teotzin
that there is no separation
that there was never another
that our fates are linked
because like mushrooms growing
at the roots of trees
we are connected
speaking to each other in
dreams & waking life
co-creating with yocoyani
with creator
because this song is ours
& we sing it as it
sings us too
spinning from the ancestors awakened
rattled
with rattles
to join the
revolution
the awakening
the people liberated
returning
to the
circle of life
//
as i take out the trash in rosmarie’s room,
tying the
green plastic into a bow
the tv goes on about
morpho butterflies
how their iridescent
cobalt blue doesn’t fade
when they die
how it endures
catching &
reflecting light
just like
in life
//
i don’t believe in death
as an end
anymore
only transformation
only energy spun & made new
only surrender of the known
that traveled by crawling
to enter flight
only in the lilies — the pink
ones & the white ones —
as you enter
the pyramids at teotihuacán
only in the rebirth of our people &
the earth
death, the bridge
//
in memory of rosmarie
free palestine