The Edge

I’m trying to recount what we’re doing here. On this planet.

Because recently everything feels like fiction.

Two thousand words, a fraction of wrong doings in the world

But I didn’t send them to you

Instead I stood under the full moon

Listened to Lightnin’ Hopkins make Blues

Traveled with a soulful saxophone under the dim light until pain wasn’t a distraction

Cried on the couch to Bettye Swann’s Then you Can Tell me Goodbye

Studied the sweaty raw familiar facial expressions of Etta James in I’d Rather Go Blind

Music at the cusp of my emotional eclipse

As a teacher of sustainable systems you want to take them to the edge. Stare at the possibility of dark dreary death down the cliff. This is where we could end up. If we fall victim.  And then you want to hold them. Wrap the arms of wisdom, indigeneity, embodied intelligence around their exasperated body.  It doesn’t have to be this way. You don’t run off into rainbows naively. You sit with them on the edge, allowing every question to pour out, every emotion, even every denial.  It can be silent for awhile. An insect comes and the student begins to watch them crawl with more fascination than the hole on the other side. The grass turns to snow, turns to budding yellow flowers. Sounds of animal predators eating animal prey in the distance. Cycles continue. Sun and moon dip and rise. One day after hours, days, months, maybe even years of watching, listening to what’s around, you notice them suddenly stand on both legs, walk to someone else, away from the edge and say hey, I think we can be better.

Not ready to say goodbye, I’d rather be a blind girl then to watch us walk away from our potential.

Photo: The Overlook, Frederick MD