This studio
It’s not an alleyway
It’s not a narrow corridor
This studio
Has a prismatic garden patch out back
A mosaic-laden patio
And a grotto, too, for that juicy wet depth
Parts for different parts of
Our
Tender-cackling aliveness
This studio
Beats me with the mallet of my own longing
And then this studio consumes my protest
Sometimes under the tree
Sometimes on the swing set
Sometimes down the slide
Aiming, together, for that base note, that casual pelvis
That resonant evocative sound that reverberates out
Softening one another’s gazes
Blood flows instead of boils
Bones bend instead of break
Lungs breathe
expand
contract
We’re in the north now
Our give back
Our earned self-possession
Is here
This
Allows us our ease
Our 5th harmonic theme
Postcards fade from memory
Buddha triumphs over Mara
Persephone style, not Venus in the half-shell
Fuck no
We’re doing front flips on tightropes
Backbends on balance beams
Tap-dancing for our ancestors’ wildest dreams
We Proceed
as if success was, indeed, Inevitable
Like a roaring creek water company
A melody of interdependent liberty
Interwoven
Now some of the largest threads in me
Expanding space-time
Atomizing, harmonizing both what’s outside and inside
This Place,
here for us
always.
Victory Over Mara, 19th Century Mongolia, Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art