Flag Abuse

I have learned to live with more and more. Long gone are those youthful days of traveling with only one bag, a Bible, a toothbrush, a nail clipper in my pocket, and one change of underwear. Long gone as well the ability to sleep on a table, a cement floor piled with ragged clothing, a hammock, a springy pull-out couch, a piece of porch, a few blankets thrown on the desert floor. This is not only a matter of my physical discomfort, the aging process, the newly acquired security of a paycheck and a condo bequeathed to me. This is also choice. This is knowing the limitations of being blinded by vision that required sacrificing pieces of my soul and realizing the deep connections felt in those fleeting encounters were only that—fleeting.

I have learned to live with more and more blessings and I know how to count them. The children have increased from the ones I birthed to the ones I raised as a nanny to the twenty in my classroom, each unique, each bringing gift of challenge, of satisfaction, of endearment. The friendships that solidify with each admittance of failure and need of assurance,. that age along the path with me, the people I allow to see my tears, my frustrations, who let me be wild, who like it when I am delighted, who aren’t afraid to tell me what they think and when I admit I am following my own star, they trust that it is ok even when it doesn’t make any sense.

The blessings of poems as well. How they gather, how they are given away. The presence I have grown into when I communicate with an audience.

I have learned to live with more and more and sometimes I imagine going back to simplicity. What if I had only one small bag, one room, only one best friend next to me? If I could chose only one poem to be taken along, which would it be? If I had only one year or one month to live, what would I let go of? What would I give away if I knew I could take nothing with me but my own heart and my own song?