SUNDAY POEM

When it’s freezing in February
February and freezing

I’ll slip into my story quilt and dream.

emerald droplets fly into the night
from the cup of my hands in your cold,
swift waters. sky widens the arc of …

SUNDAY POEM: KALI

Kali, queen of the night-sky, your skull
necklace rattles on dancing breasts.
Blood stains the cavern and corners
of your mouth. Your obsidian face gleams;
your ruby tongue defies all who claim dominion.
Your many hands grip …

BUDDHIST CHRONICLES 9

9

Yasodhara

Yesterday
the magnolia’s perfect bowl
brimmed with rain-water

Now, a single petal,
mottled cream and brown,
droops outward

The bowl is broken

Rahula runs towards me
his laughing face upturned

Two raindrops tremble
on the …

In this poem, we stand with Siddhartha at the boundary between the world we know and the one that awaits our unfolding. What threshold invites you to step into your future today? How do you feel about it? Will you …

BUDDHIST CHRONICLES

7

Siddhartha At The Boundary Of The Sakya Kingdom

Moonless night; cloud
silk across lowering sky.

In my father’s palace Yasodhara sleeps,
my son’s newborn body curled against her breast:
a snail in its shell.

I have turned …

BUDDHIST CHRONICLES

6

Suddhodana’s Dilemma

The king sits in council
with his ministers. His heir
has vanished,
choosing the ascetic’s empty bowl
over the imperial crown.

Seven sages had predicted this
the day Siddhartha was born.
His would be a …

BUDDHIST CHRONICLES

5

Yasodhara’s Lament

Tides of grief
through my veins

From this swollen heart into estuaries

I mourn the wrack
to come

I have stored pain like marrow
like treasure in the caves

of my bones

Bloodwaters crash and …

BUDDHIST CHRONICLES

4

Prajapati

I loved Siddhartha as my own
my sister’s child, suckled
at my breast

but I saw him always
for what he was

a prince
shielded by garden walls.

He had never known death;
even the flowers …

This is the third in the suite of narrative poems, the Buddhist Chronicles. Rahula was Siddhartha’s young son, born after his father left the family to seek enlightenment. If you missed the first two poems in this series, you can …

This week’s Sunday Poem is the second in a nine-part narrative series – the Buddhist Chronicles. (If you missed the first poem in the sequence, you can read it here.)

I’ve long been fascinated by the story of Siddhartha, …