Güd wrtr

You always see better with your heart,
especially when your vision is going
or has been impaired all your life.

“Nice to see you” is an expression,
not a reality, though you might well
be happy to be in someone’s orbit.

I wonder now if she, her vision mostly
gone, could see better with her heart near
the end, fighting departure as she was.

I wanted her to soften as her body
died by inches, hoped that she’d get
mooshy around the edges.

If anything, she toughened as her
skin stretched tight on bone. What
do we, the living, know about dying?

Especially if those on their way
can’t tell us. Maybe her heart was
one big puddle of love by the time

she took her last breaths. Maybe
that’s what I feel now, when she
flits into my peripheral vision—

flickers of kind, pinpoints of gentle.
Or maybe it’s because I want it
to be so, that I wish to hold her softly,

the way I wanted her to hold me,
the way she surely must have
once upon a time, when she and I

were both new.

Custards first this morning,
always in memory of the mothers

who made them—Elizabeth and
Margery, mother and daughter—

though I am not related to them
technically, certainly so spiritually,

deep in my bones, family
in the best way. Now I make

them for Margery’s husband
as well as her daughter who

long ago adopted me as aunt,
both of whom find comfort

in the little cups of eggy
sweetness that she used to

make, the one who taught me,
her legacy continuing.

While the custards bake, I head
outside to plant a tall pink

lupine that called to me
at the nursery, a replacement

for one of the babies slug-nibbled
to the ground. In another time

I’d’ve installed it in a big pot
on my mother’s patio, hoping

that her diminishing vision
would allow her not only to see it

but also remember to water it,
knowing that she would likely not,

but that my sister and I would
do so on our frequent visits.

It does not matter how attentive
they were, the mothers,

or how much they forgot.
What matters, especially after,

is that they made us, planted us,
gave us much of what we needed

and some of what we didn’t
to help us grow and thrive,

whether or not we shared
the same bloodline.

I do not know how we stay bound
at the heart by invisible threads

that stitch us together.
Only that, thank God, we do.

“It’s not about you,” our director
reminded the band as we sat
behind the curtain, blue overhead

lights waterfalling down, before
we backed up the student dancers
in their end-of-year show.

And she was right. Those in the audience
listening for my parts could not hear them,
nor could they see me at the back

of the stage, which comforted me
about the clunkers I could not avoid.
But it wasn’t about me. It was about us,

all of us, working together to make
music punctuated with outstanding
moments—the piccolo player who

nailed the “Stars & Stripes” solo that
has tortured musicians since 1896.
The drummer who out-Krupa’d

Gene (or at least did him proud)
on “Sing Sing Sing.” The raging guitar
solo, every bit as good as Jimmy’s,

on “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
And, though no one but me could
hear it, the “Stars & Stripes” bells

part that I hit spot-on at last.
Band is a team sport, and, with
the guidance of our good coach,

we scored the extra point,
we made every free-throw,
we hit homer after homer,

upping our game, making
everyone sound good and
having a great time to boot.

•••

With gratitude to Dr. Molly Redfield, music professor and director
of bands at Folsom Lake College, for welcoming me into the symphonic
wind ensemble this semester, and for her excellent conducting
and teaching that helped us all up our game.

And my thanks to my fellow band members, whose kindness
made this newcomer (and certainly its oldest member)
so happy to be in their midst.

Not just us, honey, you’ve got all
the grandparents listening to you play—

everyone who nudged you along
your musical path. Auntie Lo, of course.

When you were very small, you sat next
to her on her piano bench as she guided

your fingers on the keys and taught you
“Chopsticks.” She could play by ear

any song that you and Donna requested—
so many rounds of “A Spoonful of Sugar”

and “Supercalifragalisticexpialidocious”.
Here’s Grandpa Keeley, whose piano you

once lay under, feeling the vibrations of
Chopin and Gershwin through the floorboards.

Over there is Mrs. Meinyer, the Bonicelli’s
Music piano teacher who taught you to

read treble and bass clef, which came
in handy later for bells and tympani.

Not to forget percussion teacher Stan Lunetta,
band directors like Don Whitehead.

Mr. Rolicheck, your eighth-grade homeroom
teacher who insisted that you sing a solo

at graduation, who had endless confidence
in your budding writer self, once intoning,

“You, Miss Haag, have potential.” And look
at you, ages later—so many ages—

still putting that potential to good use.
The music never left; it’s been waiting for you.

Of course, those of us with wings are watching
from the wings. We always will as you continue

to grow yours. Can you feel them lifting now,
ready to help you soar?

We take up the back half of the stage,
two bands divided by a grand piano—

jazz stage left, wind ensemble stage right—
some of us in both, me dazzled, literally,

by bright lights. I haven’t played onstage
in a half century, but I remember these

pseudo stars gleaming overhead,
red streaks raining down in sheets and,

as the dancers rehearse, all kinds of color
tattooing their lithe bodies. I am agog at

the stagecraft—the capable stage manager
and riggers warning us to watch out

as they lower trusses and adjust tall black
curtains, while up high over the stage

in the fly loft mysterious equipment
waits in the shadows for its cue.

And when someone calls “Blackout!”
I extinguish the slender light clamped to

the music stand before me, then lower
myself to sit in this theatrical womb,

watching for the signal to rise, pick up two
mallets, locate the director’s white baton

poised in the half-light, wait for her
downbeat, and begin.

(for Lindsey Holloway)

And then the magic of May drizzle,
droplets falling like mercy’s gentle rain

as we walk back from a late brunch,
stopping to sniff roses for scent

(pretty pinks, no rosy smell), you
naming plant neighbors on your street,

(the heart-shaped leaves on the lushly
blooming catalpa tree!), greenery

as familiar to you as the folks who tend it.
Me noticing wee drops polka-dotting

the variegated leaves of hostas as I resolve
to photograph the translucent pearls

decorating the fully blooming cosmos and
calendula in my yard, on the insect-nibbled

plumbago (bugs gotta eat, too) and stockpile
the cool for the sizzling days to come.

Then the hose and I will shower the thirsty ones,
when we will all fondly recall rain,

our occasional visitor, who will by then
have migrated east over the Sierra

and hightailing it north for summer,
as is its habit, without a backward glance.

Lanky, easygoing Louis used to say
when he and other college student
editors were on deadline,

pushing to get an old-fashioned
newspaper pasted up on poster-
board-sized pages that I would

eventually drive 33 miles down
the highway to the printer. Louis could
read the tension in the room that

we advisers didn’t always try to quell,
figuring that a little pressure might
help us all move more quickly.

Though it could also prompt small
eruptions between co-workers who,
we used to say, would not likely

have known each other if they hadn’t
come together to do this specific thing:
learn how to write, edit and produce

a student newspaper at the same time
they had to write, edit and produce
the paper every couple of weeks.

Now at another community college
five years after I retired from mine,
nearly 50 years after I hung up my

bells mallets, a week before the big
performance, shit’s gettin’ serious.
But I admire the way this young music

professor keeps the room calm,
rehearses her wind ensemble with
a light touch, though we all know

we’re far from perfect. I used to tell
my students that there’d never
been a perfect publication,

that there never would be, that we’d
do our best with the time we had,
each issue a kind of practice session,

that no one would die if it was less
than sterling. Which, oddly, calms me
as I move between bells and triangle,

xylophone and crash cymbals,
counting rests and entrances,
hoping to play most of the right

notes at the mostly the right time,
reminding myself how happy I am—
truly—to be here, making music

with others in a band once again.

Never walked a labyrinth before.
What’m I s’posed to do?
Just walk? What if I get lost?
Whaddya mean, I can’t get lost?
I can always get lost.
Just follow the path to the center?
What do I do there?
Anything I want, huh?
Then walk back out?
Huh.
Walking meditation, you say?
Does it help?
Won’t know till I try it, I s’pose.

And he does, his big boots stepping
slowly, stopping when he sees
a small rock heart here and there
on the path, kneels, reaches a
tentative finger to touch it
before rising and going on.

No one has suggested that John do so.
He just does.

I watch him walk his first labyrinth,
hope he picks up a tiny heart,
not only recognizing love on the path
but perhaps being moved to hold it,
take it with him, as people do.
Do with it what they will.

As people are doing all over the world
today, tracing the circular, winding path
leading to center and back out,
perhaps picking up a morsel of peace
and a dose of lovingkindness
with every step.

•••

(On World Labyrinth Day, May 2, 2026, at the
Unitarian Universalist Society of Sacramento labyrinth)

First, how did the artist
with the spray can reach
the bridge’s undercarriage

to paint “MEDITATE” in a
surprisingly legible hand?
Crawl? Rappel over the side?

And did the artful one imagine
that the word might convince
a passer-by perhaps paddling

below to calm the mind, if not
the body, in mid-paddle? And
might the kayak’d one think,

sure, this is as good a time
as any to close the eyes, feel
the breath, find some peace?

I picture someone hanging
precariously, attempting to
quiet their own monkey mind

and hammering heart as their
hand traces letters onto steel,
arched under a bridge called

Rainbow, over a river called
American, utterly focused,
not thinking of the potential

drop to the water’s surface,
living in that creative moment,
meditatively soaking up the view.

Who am I to say that there are
better ways to deliver a message?
Who’s to say that it wasn’t a deeply

contemplative experience for
the artist—as it has been for me,
comfortably seated, eyes closed,

imagining the scenario,
in the right here,
in the right now?

Well, the ancestors for sure.
Especially the ones who never knew me
but laid down the path I now walk.

The parents, too, who made me
in more ways than the original one,
far from perfect, perfect for me.

The sister I didn’t know I needed,
the steady, can’t-do-without-her
being who shares so much of my DNA.

The first BFF who’s still the BFF.
Also the BFF who declared herself so,
then later vanished into mystery

yet sidles up to me when I’m on
my knees, hands in the dirt,
plant-praying, as she used to say.

The women. The good, good women
who’ve taught me and loved me
and accompanied me always.

The men. The good, good men,
of whom I’ve happily had many,
as lovers, as friends, one husband,

and the beloved who’s stuck with
me for decades. Friends, friends,
friends, long ago and in the now,

the people family, the animal familia,
the acquaintances who left more
of a mark than they’ll ever knew.

Like the young woman at Home Depot
who deployed her little ray gun on
the Johnny Jump Ups I found there

after looking everywhere, who
grinned and said exactly what
I thought as I looked at their tiny

pansy faces: “Aren’t they happy
little things?” I held her eyes
with mine, our fingers touching

as she handed me the receipt.
“They so are,” I said, adding
to myself, “and so are we.”