Diary 6/9/18

Beak to Beak

There is a teenage fledgeling robin that hops/flutters up to a branch in the bush outside my window. Almost every afternoon it is there peering out through the cover of leafy branches. A parent arrives shortly thereafter, dropping food on the ground as its offspring gets down to join them. Sometimes the parent bird perches on the same branch and tucks some tidbit directly into its beak before swooping away again. The younger bird sits amid the avian camouflage, its small head taking in the world from side to side. By evening they are both gone. I expect that before long I won’t be seeing either of them at such close quarters. I have no idea where their nesting site is. It is a secure arrangement.

I have never observed this before. I assumed all nourishment took place in a nest until the babies could fend for themselves. I am always curious about the habits of how other creatures do their parenting. I found out that actually, these particular descendants of the dinosaurs take a full year to live on their own. They first have to learn the migration route to and from their summer and winter territories.

This Desert

                                              mid 90’s, rewritten 6/9/18 Judi Bachrach

I used to think that love looked like this:

A mother holds her child tightly to her breast.

She only lets go as the child needs her to

her arms remain there always.

This never happened with me.

Does it mean I was never loved ?

There are many answers

but only one is true.

I didn’t know

the painful holes in my childhood

would create the strongest possible jar

to hold my longing for Love

I say,”YES !”

and Love breaks the jar

again and again

until there is no me

no you

no jar

no way

to die of thirst in this desert anymore.

When I wrote this poem back in the early 90’s I couldn’t have imagined that my jar would be ground into dust. I didn’t realize that the disappearance of me, a jar, and even the idea of a limited God could be the best thirst quencher it has lately become. I couldn’t have known how much I would have to keep saying Yes to all that life brought me. Since Richard’s death, the underlying comprehension that we are Love itself has rerouted my faith. As much as I cling to my personal jar, it is no longer essential, I know it is not who I really am. Like the fledgeling robin, I still need beak to beak sustenance before I can remember that I carry my well within me wherever I go.