Anxiety

In the midst of northern cold, self sufficiency
shrivels in washed-out light.

Outside, neighborhood children play boisterously.
Are they unpracticed in the art of worry?

Before long my fears rise up
like sucker shoots from crabapple tree roots.

According to Steve Hagen,
Reality does not need to be explained.

We cannot avoid spreading our shadows
unknowingly, unwillingly.

Wandering Israelites were told to consume at once
the manna God sent them — or it would rot.

Anything can happen. Someday
my skull could be a trophy mounted on a spear.

Jane Kenyon wrote, If it’s darkness we’re having,
let it be extravagant.

Is our final freedom losing control
with equanimity?

The wood stork holds out her wings to dry them.
She makes herself completely vulnerable to predators.

I want to be clumped together like bread dough —
kneaded, turned, punched, made ready to rise.

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