Sunday's Word

BODHISATTVA BRINGS HER RAKUSU BY THE HOUSE

for Carole Folsom-Hill

His friend sews her rakusu
prior to taking her vows.
"Having vows to break is the bodhisattva path."
His friend shows him patches of cloth
given by her friends.

"This is the beginning of learning."
He looks at her words in the notebook.
The circle of oak from the tree
in the community garden
binds the decades they have in common.

The patched together piece of cloth
worn around the neck. The pattern of patches
mirroring ice fields. Stitching her rakusu
she takes refuge in the breathing.
Practice with all for the benefit of all.

Jim Bodeen
20 December 2010

Carole Folsom-Hill's Rakusu Robe

THE WITNESS

And what does the witness do now?
Cautioned by prosecutor and judge already.

Asylum not granted.
Murdered parents is fact not questioned.
But terrorized? Tortured?
A few phone calls.
Rumors.
Generally credible and consistent testimony has not established the case.
A few phone calls.
Rumors.

And has the State not looked deeply into this?

The witness enters the courtroom with priviliged eyes of a citizen.

How in the wind?
How itinerant?

The judge said "Good luck."
It's over.

Is the witness complaining?

Jim Bodeen
18 December 2010


PUTTING LANGUAGE IN THE HANDS OF THE JUDGE

When the word for wait is hope
When the word for hope is wait
When the word gets taken away
When the law becomes the word
When the word becomes dictation

"OK folks, that's it. Good luck."

Jim Bodeen
17 December 2010


THE POEM WALKS A STRAIGHT LINE

Nobody will understand, Karen says.
Facts build the line, not me.
No place for story to get lost.
No place to get sidetracked.
Mind can follow multiple truths
placed side by side.
People get fooled but people aren't fools.
I'm trying just like the old man at Riverview.
I'm not asking anyone to follow.
I still have my teeth and my notebook.

Jim Bodeen
16 December 2010


TESTIMONIO, TESTIMONY

Immigration court in Seattle
Pueblo de Dios/People of God
Against the empire, man and woman, married--

Judge, prosecutor, defender
Turn it over to the notebook
which is grateful, without fear

Day Two, crossing three months,
Storypath/cuentocamino--look around
Notebook opens again for Parker T Ball Jotter

Jim Bodeen
16 December 2010


DHARMA DOWN 99

We're on our way
                     man
                   out of town
                go hitching down
                   that highway 99
"Night Highway Down"/Mountains and Rivers Without End
                    Gary Snyder

Weekday morning workday
humpday in all terrain outback
ski shop where my son's one
of the characters on the highway
heading into Seattle going
South all down the coast way
to San Francisco. Access the unseen
where you are, slouching
into the city. Watch him cut skins
for skis wanting outside boundaries,
go get the crew burgers
from Burgermaster creeping north
from the university of days past.

Passing out sandwiches the man
against the rock on snow in the photo
asks me how it is the father brings food
to a place like this. The likeness
in the photo's all the clue I need.
Anyone skiing against that rock
knows humility I need to get me
through the afternoon.
Hanging to a piece of ice, he says.
I need the other much more than the other
needs me, I say. But for my friends,
those edges would not have held, he says.
None of us are vulnerable though.
None of us. Let the ice stay ice.

Jim Bodeen
15 December 2010


SUNDAY'S WORD AT RIVERVIEW

I'm trying, the Vice-President says,
when I ask for the word, saying Good Morning.
Oh, Mr. Vice-President, you make me dizzy.
I'll carry your words all day,
repeating them to the nurse
as I go around the corner.
Mr. Gore says, 'I'm trying.'
I'll never need inspiration again.

The denturist has his dentures,
the nurse says, grounding me for the moment,
while I take in the reality
of Mr. Gore's steeper ascent.

Jim Bodeen
15 December 2010