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The forests have been closed for weeks.
The pines are brittle with few needles.
A silent warning in the din of machinery:
the environmentally blind are killing us.
A gust uplifts me
to receive the soughing
as prayer for survival.
Wrappers from my chemically laden meal
threaten to blow.
The wind whistles on my water bottle spout.
In ancient times also
there were mind explorers,
body worshippers,
disappointments to their mothers.
When time was a blessing
on a too tight rope
they were initiated into
the hearts of baboons.
Offerings above, please.
Bodies below.
As the dead sun sleeps
in the netherworld each night
spirits return to their mummies.
Ancestors pray.
May their bones be knit together,
their members be made firm.
I take my abundant and minimal talents
to visit my elderly parents.
My father trails a canuli, slowly.
His heart and lungs fight his intentions.
It is early March.
The smell of dark, damp earth emerges
as I walk to the creek I have not seen
or touched in forty years.
I pick two wet rocks dazzling with mica
which dry into brown remnants of the past.
I hold them like gold, something of value,
at least something that lasts.
I am washed with the currents of life,
memories of the rock hardness of youth.
My father apologizes in many ways.
I tell him its okay.
We all set up challenges
for our children.
With forgiveness mixed
with the heaviness of finalities,
I accept my responsibilities.
I create my own burdens.
I travel with rocks in my suitcase.
Belinda Subraman is a Registered Nurse living in New Mexico. In print, she is the editor of Gypsy Magazine and the owner of Vergin' Press. On the Web, she runs Gypsy Art Show and BelindaSubraman.com. She has published her poetry extensively both on the page and in audio recording, and her papers are archived at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque.