A Simple Lesson I woke to a day that would be like all the others I would ready myself, present myself to Teacher, Listen, try, and fail And though Teacher’s admonitions would be gentle, I would feel their sting as if a thousand wasps assailed me Doubts beset me as constant waiting enemies It was […]
Teacher sent me down the poetry road to find Hafiz But he’s dead, I protested What can I learn from him? Perhaps nothing, Teacher said But I still had to go It wasn’t long before I found Hafiz on the road He couldn’t have known who I was But he’s a wily old codger (I […]
Hang on, Teacher shouted from behind me But I had no breath to answer Our raft sped toward the boulders And huge sprays of water crashed into the air The current carried tree limbs and every form of flotsam Forward into chaos Soon our raft would join the bits of flotsam And I was gripped […]
I went to TeacherHumbly admitting“I don’t know how to pray.”Then I waited for the wise instructionI knew would surely come.But, “Walk with me,” Teacher saidLeading me into the spring day.We wandered through the forest.Teacher was silent, thinking deeply, I was certain,On what to tell me,How best to teach me to pray.I relaxed into the softness […]
About ten years ago I wrote a poem that seemed to be speaking in the voice of an unexpected character. It was the birth poem for Teacher, a continuing character in many of my poems, usually carrying forward some wisdom that I didn’t know I had. Recently, Margaret Nash (Peggy) Rubin, a wisdom teacher of […]