Caroline Reddy
Blinking Orbs
I awakened from resting in child’s pose
for I couldn’t digest
the silence any longer.
The beige couch
was stained with heavy sighs
that had become
the only sound of comfort
when the world had shut down.
I followed a trail of online experiences
as Cyberspace
became an infinite web of longing
and belonging:
tiny blinking orbs
began to illuminate the cords
of Indra’s net
as the veil between dimensions
continues to become thin
and transparent.
Through the internet
I internalized some of that blaze
to disperse the Small me
and expanded towards
the Amalfi coast of Italy
and the Northern lights of Iceland.
The orbs summoned me
to collect the shards
as the tarot spread
brought forth the tower
and swept will-o'-the-wisp
out of the chat box.
I met you all then:
the singer who sings in Farsi
the sensei who taught me during his tour,
the yoga teacher whose dachshunds makes
my face crinkle out a smile,
when I want to cry.
I pushed past my collapse
as I dreamt of the breath of fire
igniting life underneath the tired
flesh.
I return—
to the lights of the city stores,
and the hum of copy machines,
for I own fairy lights now
that can link me
into the ring of these bright jewels
and orbs that blink
throughout the globe.
The Final Dokusan (My Zen Teacher’s Last Breath)
I watched
as your body shriveled before me
and meditated in stillness—
wondering if your ashes
have kept the turtles company.
After our last dokusan
when I told you about
how music had been murdered
you wanted me
to keep the legacy
of the living world alive
through whirling words on the page
like a Merlin-magician
but I wasn’t sure if I could
unscramble my brain
to make sense of your directions
as we approached the sesshin
at The Garrison Institute…
and after our last dokusan
I went for a hike
and took pictures of the amber
leaves as the sun burst
through the camera
not knowing that it would
be the last time we spoke.
I held onto the ceramic
statue of Jizo
and found a monk’s smile
to help me untangle the strings
and emptied my hands
so that I can continue
to chop wood
and carry water.
Torn
I stopped playing with words
to make sense of the world
for the thought of being ripped
torn into tiny pieces
by a pair of scissors angling towards
my chest
as everyone watched the shredded work
made me revere the void
that I had created.
it was just a technique—
that’s what the professor said:
this is how you edit…
And I watched his hands
as my voice trembled to the floor.
I observed
as my belly became big
with double chocolate fudge ice-cream dripping
over a stack of fluffy buttermilk pancakes– extra
whip cream clogging my throat:
and the silent years followed:
subdued
numb…
with hamburger buns…
and the fog remained
as
I hovered
above each sentence
wondering if I would ever find my voice again.
Caroline Reddy's accepted and published works include poems in ActiveMuse, Bethlehem Writers Roundtable, Braided Way, Cacti-Fur, Clinch, and Star*line among others. In 2021, her poem A Sacred Dance was nominated for Best of The Net prize by Active Muse. Caroline has also written a book review for a volume of poetry by award-winning poet Claudine Nash. A native of Shiraz, Iran, she is working on a collection of poems called StarBeing which chronicles the life of a Starseed on earth.