Prana

How can I know it—

a Western woman

          hearing the sea

reading sentences

inscribed on paper

          gently waving in

and imagining

with one life’s practice?

How can I acquire

Prāṇāyāma here

          quickly rolling out

alone in my house

without assistance

          becoming ocean

now that time passes

from fall to winter?

Reverse the flow and

inhale to ocean

          again and again

exhale to shore and

sand when I believe

          as is all nature

I am sitting still

and spirit rises?

How to take a chance

for enlightenment

          leaving illusion

and dance beyond

the garden I grew

         of separateness

into larger pastures

which will never end?   

So much pain in me
and around the world
         entering oceans
must have an ending,
must become something
          again and again
more.  O!  Let me know
such boundless freedom.  

Poets United Poetry Pantry

Copyright © 2015  S.L.Chast

Stewardship

International recycling symbol

She’s not wearing her work gloves again, but

she’s picking up the litter from her lawn,

her daily task as steward of the corner.

Black plastic sandwich-shop bags are empty,

but not pizza boxes or water ice cups

gooey with sugar, crawling with ants.

Soda cans, beer bottles and bottle caps

recycle, papers and flyers do too

un-crunched, smoothed, read and piled.

She chatters back at the squirrels from under

her yellow baseball cap, from under her hunched back,

from over her unsteady hip-stiffened walk.

She coaxes the robins to hop closer,

calls them her herd, her grazing goats and asks

them with a chuckle Why not mow the lawn?

While yer at it, why not trim the edges?

These drivers, cleaning their cars on my lawn!

It’s not the school kids, I like the school kids.

But they laugh at her, these stylish children,

who discard whatevers with abandon

as they stroll past without pausing their pace.

She’s moving slower today, probably

pleased to salvage and recycle, to walk

each next day on her little piece of earth.

For my prompt 

Poets United Midweek Motif ~Earth Day or Earthiness

For #21 April poem ~ I'm a day behind.

Copyright © 2015  S.L.Chast

Joining the Chorus

Joining the Chorus

Chagal: Stained Glass memorial at UN

Notes that run through silence up from earth and out out—

vibration that moves from planted foot to lifted mouth—

yes, those—strum that signature, sing the song that is self.

True self often surfaces as age wears us down,

but you dug swiftly through bling, hype, expectation—

as if you had a key—you are the key, singing.

You opened doors as you passed them by so eager

to meet more like you singing their true songs in key—

in time—for melody, harmony, symphony.

Prelude to the Age of Capricorn, you lead us

fearlessly past judgment into justice itself—

a community reel complete with violins.

Notes that run through silence up from earth and out out—

vibration that moves from planted feet to lifted mouths.

For my prompt 

Poets United Midweek Motif ~ MUSIC

Copyright © 2014 S.L.Chast

All Hallows Eve

source

In the wee hours, the cats came by, not you.

Here is Pierette who lived to be nineteen

smoothing her way past Wicca from before.

How small Wicca is, though still larger than 

Red, the first of the three, who was poisoned 

in a neighbor’s yard.  Red is pure white still.

Pierette sniffs Red first—her own black and white 

camouflages him while she licks and purrs.

Grey Wicca watches and poses to pounce,

her question-mark tail quivering, claws out.

Tears stream down and I taste salt on my lips.

I hold my tabby cat Miracle in 

candlelight—her fur stands up and she yowls.

The two of us watch three ghost cats play and 

smell fresh bacon I made in case you came.

Did you eat elsewhere or watch us, love?

Written for my prompt  Poets United Midweek Motif ~ Halloween, or Celebrating the Dead.

Copyright © 2014 S.L.Chast

Shapeshifting

Political Cartoon by Benjamin Franklin (1754)
recycled during the French and Indian War and then  revived as
"unite, or die" to encourage the former colonies to unite against British rule.

Give me 26 letters

and squiggles to play with and

I will tool a poem on your

hand-made leather belt, supple

round your waist—or I will paint

it on a live rattlesnake

coiling code round arms and neck.

Rattlesnake beauty has its

venom, tail to warn and fangs

to strike—all three equally

hold the magic of presence

in the stonewalls of my youth

in the aggressiveness of

a young nation, “Join or die.”

Let’s tattoo instead, fashion

dictates a phrase or two will

do, less than a haiku’s length

in pieces or whole at least

an arm’s length or swallowing

its tale in a big O—what?

Snakes sleep on the stone sidewalk!

Good luck greets us on the steps

and slithers away from our

presence.  In the pine forest

remnants of cow pasture walls

we hear but don’t see rattlers

and fear poison ivy more

lacing the paths’ fern edging

Grandfather took me to climb

the V-bed of a young stream

instead: The stone walls can slip;

they’re too dangerous to climb.

Listen to the rattle call

and you’ll fall, he said from cool

stepping stones mid-stream and moss.

The stream snaked forward and stone

walls snaked over pine carpets

story boarding the lengthy

days of childhood.  I heard my

mother’s dead brother was snake

keeper of Bear Mountain, my

amazing unknown Uncle.

A heart attack took him young

forever softened image

of love and alchemy, gold

in dross, he swims and coils

my Ouroboros uncle

forever renewed in the

Never land of Peter Pan

Snake bracelets, rings and earrings

are made of precious metal

in reverence of the force

abused in Eve’s Garden, who

are our whisperers today

modeling transformation

and shedding, shedding of skin

And that is how I know you

so deeply, our contrasting

skins entwined, braided, touching

inside and out, extending

imaginary into

real time.  O! this is our time—

this is how poetry glows.

Written for my prompt 

Poets United Midweek Motif ~ World Snake Day

and, it seems, 
for dVerse Poets Pub where Claudia prompts

3 year Anniversary– Celebrating Poets

Copyright © 2014  S.L.Chast

Water from the Well

Rainbow over the Hauraki Gulf by Tomwsulcer and Haley Sulcer

            Long time past I believed God was a joke

community played on innocent by-

standers—a “Look Up!” game that we joined so

no one would know we had been taken in.

I was entranced by images of God

but more so by coincidence and land-

and city-scapes that draped me with their moods:

invisible presences whispering.

“I am; we are” breathed God repeatedly

until I heard the unambiguous

inhale~exhale~heart beat~inhale~exhale

of now upheld by past and leading on.

I am not joking when I say that thirst

led me past mirages to real water. 

Posted at Poets United 

Poetry Pantry #192.

Copyright © 2014  S.L.Chast