Author: cfblack
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Rhinocerous rain
Driving north out of Nashville, traffic thickens to a slow confession near Fort Campbell, brake lights bloom like votive candles stretching out into Kentucky. I think of Thomas Merton, cloistered among the knobs and forests of Gethsemani Monastery. Where silence became a discipline. Prayer was not an escape, but another way of entering the world.…
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Lessons I learned from trees
no matter the girth of your trunk, the thickness of your bark, the depth of your roots if you lean too far to the right, too far to the left, too far forward or too far back, the heady weight of your branches will gather up the wind and snap you off at your base…
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Ecdysis
fling your feelings of unworthiness into the void this is not an act of despair this is finding the space to grow _____ finding the space to grow throw your feelings of unworthiness into the void shed despair like an old snake’s skin 6-25-26
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Of the Pond
yesterday’s rain paints water a dull, muddy gray the sun catches a lone mallard’s V-shaped wake light reflects gold before the ripple dissipates back into the dull, muddy gray of last night’s rain 6-19-26
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Pocket change
Staring into the well I contemplate cake candle and chicken bone wishes that are long overdue. I jingle coins in my pocket and wonder how the demise of the penny will impact the number and odds for wish requests and if the number of affirmations will decrease in proportion to the number of requests or…
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In the Garden
evolution dresses the flower in flirty colored petals endows it with unspoken cravings for visits of the bumbling bee the caress of butterflies upon erect stamens dusted pollen on pristine pistils gifted by anonymous one night stands 6-14-26
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Change 2026
thunder proceeds the storm the flash – the swirling winds we were not deaf or blind we disregarded warnings we got caught in the rain and only have ourselves to blame and only we can drag ourselves inside dry off and change our clothes 6-13-26
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haiku of swelter
geese swim the shadows I watch from a shady bench drake rests in high grass 6-13-26
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end of season
Summer came they sheared the dog went to the beach stripped naked or as close as the law allowed They hoped a shark would not catch them off shore – off guard, there would be less cloth to spit before it swallows they also hoped a shark would not catch them off guard – on…
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Acceptance
Some would say that love is for joy and when it stops being about joy, it ceases being love. But I say, “Love is for itself.” It gives and takes, caresses and abuses. It is the disease and remedy. We must swallow the prescribed medicine, because refusal is madness, acceptance the cure. You may ask,…
My husband's poetry 