Full Term: Mother

I am your mother. 
I have trouble seeing what is not in front of me.
I plan too much, transition awkwardly, and intimidate unknowingly. 
I expect a lot. 

I will meet the challenge to think about you, more than you think about you, head on. 

I will retreat into myself and be lost,
I will insist on venturing out further than you’re comfortable. 

I will think I know what I’m doing. 
I will think I’m right. 

I will lead you to be proud, that leads to fall.
I will lead you to go boldly, for real confidence. 

I ask for help, and I will show you how. 
I say what I want, and I will show you how.

I throw away plans, I transition in a heartbeat, I become low.
I expect a lot,
from Him that I cannot see in front me. 

I am your mother.

Photo by Taylor Sporleder

Pregnancy.

A time where you can wake up every day in your body and not recognize anything. A time full of angles and perspectives that shift so fast you can’t keep up with your own geometry. One minute, you’re sure life has changed but can’t see how. The next minute, every mirror you pass is a challenge to remember that you are still yourself underneath that shifting sphere. You wake up feeling you’ll never be the same, and go to bed with a foreboding sense that soon enough, your bones will feel that normal, lonely, individualism again, carrying nothing but their own weight.

I am “us”, but only for a moment. Then you will be you, and I will be some form of “me” again. And I’ll spend my whole life trying to get as close to you as I am now. And I’m guessing that chase will involve more aches and pains, more sleepless nights, and more absurd side effects. I’m praying it will also involve more moments where you stop me from whatever I’m doing and I think, “don’t move, he’s right there.”

Here’s to pregnancy.

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Photos by Taylor Sporleder

Room 373

I will often be there

At the moment we stand staring

At your profile

In the hotel mirror

Your body inches its center of gravity

Toward a layered eternity.

You hold one more forever in your womb.

An unending soul begun

Among the incidental wonder

Of our surrogate roles.

A story of Life and Death unfolds already

Set Uniquely against the repetitive predictability

Of room 373 down at the end of the hall.

What a fragile contemplation

Is new life,

Nothing my caffeine laced thoughts

Or power button thumbs

And screen savor eyes can't ignore for a moment.

I will often be here

At the moment I stand staring out the window at Spokane signage

Unable to sleep

Feebly considering the fate of that person- named already but not yet to us-

All we have to offer you is Alias,

Halfway house,

Transition,

Hotel room,

While some great River

Ushers you in 

to Ocean you will never

See the floor

Know the scope

But never not explore

Cling to hope

And drown.

All things now for you, alive,

Trend to die.

This is the direction of birth,

From water to air

The only way in is out.

The only way up is down.

Where Your Silence Lives

I have always lived for love of getting lost.

Hiding in plain sight, I’ve crafted as my art.

Forests and backyards, no matter cost,

never should be far apart.

You will someday live for love of being found,

biding time at night, unmoved by silent dark,

tenuous till sun kisses the ground.

Then adventure, sudden, stark

Starts. Not noisy rush toward a goal; it is

hidden in the raw pursuit of silent place;

Buried under crowd, beneath quick buzz.

“Hear, not Speak.” And “Wait, not Race.”

I will beg you: join me, journey more remote.

I will ask you: tell me where your silence lives.

If you’re anything like me, then know

Vast and open thrill He gives.

In between the stars is void to human eye:

Don’t be fooled, for even Empty once was built.

To the call, the gall, of questions, make reply:

I am proof that Here is filled.

Make all space your playground - Lost your Art -

Take all clearings in your arms, and introduce

Lightning, contact from two points apart.

Forests bow to proper use.

Son, you level earth with names, with what you make.

This is joy I offer you, as it was offered me:

Take words to nameless pain, convert the ache

In the man;

step in

and be

Present. When - as we all do - comes doubt dark-hued,

Walk the questions back to forests, where no words 

Can invade, no sounds intrude,

except: 

the loudest silence

you have ever heard.

He is

the loudest silence 

I have ever heard.

Moonlit Goodnight

Sleep, my son,

when all the world keeps turning,

leave the 

wake, my son,

how low the candle’s burning,

please don’t

wait, my son,

for anyone’s returning:

there is time left

to rest.

Keep, my son,

your own word and its wording,

let it

steep, my son,

that thought you have been herding,

as if

sheep, my son,

are counted when converting

open eyes in-

to closed.

Stay, my son,

in peaceful states of minding,

watch and 

pray, my son,

for hours of unwinding,

feel it

lay, my son,

your own head down from finding

things for your gaze

to fix.

Gray, my son,

is the evening you’re behind-ing,

hold at

bay, my son

the fussing and the whining,

you’re o-

kay, my son,

the clouds have silver lining

long before first light

under Moonlit Goodnight.

He does not know his true name.

There is anger in a man:

he does not know his true name.

It is ours to grow into a world

where we are reminded what our name is not.

It is Eve’s to remind us - and she should.

There is an aching in the gut 

(just beneath the heart)

that begs questions from the dirt used in our clay,

our composition: one of primal things

and primary.

We were made first

once -

no longer.

Now we are realized latest and last,

lost to that void of namelessness.

Every construct given is an empty nicknaming

attempt to fill the space

between who we are

and who we are supposed to be.

All the base

longings demonstrate how far

we are

from who we are supposed to be.

Every face

asks us for our name.

Do you know it yet?

I do not name you, son,

and if you're lucky

you'll know how no one can.

How slow creaks the door closing

in on your identity,

how near passes the comet - 

don't you wish it would be meteor?

Barreling down on your home,

at least then you could watch it go up

in flames.

That is the thing about names:

we are obsessed with them,

we know nothing without them.

Can I know you

if I do not name you

child?

I must address you somehow.

I must confess

I do not know your name.

No one 

here 

does.

Here is my heart, and how to burn it down.

To love you 

Is to set aside my armor

To show you: come,

Here is the deepest room 

In the furthest reaches

Of my house.

Here is my heart

and how to burn it down.

I grant you the same permission 

I gave her:

Hurt me

if you will.

You will

all but destroy me.

Loving you -

loving her - 

is rapt stare at a fire

I did not start;

you are sacred cleansing art -

catch on the altar

and we will collaborate on this part:

flames only tend

one direction.

To know you

is an inflection 

of the tongue,

one I’ve never made before,

language I cannot yet articulate.

My mind is not young like yours:

you will speak this sooner than me.

But I will exhaust each breath

inside each lung,

before I live in a world where 

we do not share 

common ground or grammar.

You will watch me shed tears,

hide tears,

I will startle, stutter

stammer,

but meaning

is more stubborn than my weakness.

We will both be translated

before long.

We will both be changed.

We will both be spoken strong.

We will both be rebels against God.

We will both be wrong.

From Belize

Photo by Taylor Sporleder

The ocean between us has me remembering the first time I was out of the country on your birthday, also the Caribbean. You sent me away with poetry.

But I’m more excited to see what the closing lines of your 20’s will be like. You’ve always been good at ending a poem that seemed to be saying so many things, with a line that conveys it was really only about one very important thing. Maybe 29 isn’t normally the most memorable year for people, but I know you. I know your philosophy on finales. I know that you would say the beginning is only good if the ending is tac-sharp, intended, and arresting. And it’s not because you’ve planned it. You’ll feel your way there. You’ll stumble on it as you’re walking on no discernible path and listening to the twigs and leaves crunch under your feet. And hopefully I’m getting better at being less terrified of that. This decade has proven that the best endings always seem to find their way into your poetry. 

So here’s to the long walk that led you up to this year, and to the last stanza of your twenties that will find you in the year to come. 
Happy Birthday from Belize, Evan

Goodbye "pink house"

We said goodbye to another place that tells part of our story. So grateful in goodbye for something we didn't deserve in the first place. Thankful for the sweet-smelling, well-lit and well-shadowed memories. Thankful for a great "shelter", through some of our most trying and joyful times. Thanks to the Giver of all good things.