HAIBUN:
For the Ghosts of My Parents
in Autumn
By Peter Fortunato
In October, leaves down, the long lawns underfoot,
high season long past. No more the mower,
the rake over tennis court sand, the skimming net
to sweep the pool. Summer guests gone.
Flower beds asleep. My parents pull the leaves into
great heaps for burning.
Smoke scent lifts me, child
racing to the burning pile:
mother wipes her tears.
Father pokes the flames.
Flannel shirt and unshaved jaw,
cigarette unlit.
Their work yokes them. Outdoors to keep the grounds,
early mornings scrubbing kitchen pans, late nights,
dining room closed, yet the business makes demands.
As a child, my words are careful not to interrupt.
I stand back and see them straining.
He flashes angry
counting cash, slams the drawer:
empty room ringing.
His laughter leaning
on his rake, face flushed by fire,
my mother smiling.
Hissing Italian
she scrapes names to call him from
the bottom of a pot.
I am an only child and memory is my consolation
now that they are both gone. I note how quietly the
leaves fall this autumn,
October golden and mild until the end.
Not with the rattle, nor with the drum,
they dance their deaths in silence.
Leaves bright and dry, light
upon my back, a huge bundle –
my parents’ absence.
Heaping leaves high:
a mountain of leaves I built
a mountain of leaves!
Return to the earth:
leaf pile shifting, settles,
memories sift through.
PETER FORTUNATO
from Late Morning:
New and Selected Poems
Peter Fortunato is a poet and artist, a writer of fiction and non-fiction, who holds a Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of North Carolina – Greensboro. He is also certified as a hypnotherapist by the New England Institute for Neurolinguistic Programming. He taught writing at Cornell and Ithaca College for many years and has been a Buddhist practitioner for most of his life. His Web site is www.peterfortunato.wordpress.com His recent book of poetry, Late Morning: New and Selected Poems is available at http://www.amazon.com/Late-Morning-New-Selected Poems/dp/1600478395/ref=la_B001KIX0X0_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1367263594&sr=1-1
More Articles from
the Winter 2015/2016
Metaphysical Times
(complete listing click here)
________________
The King Ferry –
Nowella and Uncle Threadbear
by Oren Pierce
Teddy Bears and other manufactured, companion-animals (including one very
small Lamb who will play a large part in the following chapter), everyone of them
abandoned by children, all lived together
in an old trunk. The Trunk Animals were
mostly not talkers because, for the
most part, their mouths were not
true mouths but were just painted or
sewn on, and so they didn’t talk so
much as they mumbled, grumbled,
or sometimes hummed … and some
hummed most all the time until
someone, usually Uncle Threadbear,
asked them to please stop.
(Go to Article)
______________________
Reiki Part XIII
Soul Energy
by Don Brennan
If we are referring to energy healing,
the most appropriate interpretation
for the word “Reiki,” is Soul Energy.
The word now has other associations
in contemporary Japan, having to do
with the ghost world and the occult,
but originally it represented the unity
of heaven, earth and man.
(Go to Article)
______________________
How Should I
Work With
My Spirit Guides
by Corbie Mitleid
When I talk about Spirit Guides, I talk
about those discarnate beings that help
us move along on our Earthwalk with compassion, wisdom, and often advice.
But there is a big difference, for me,
between spirit guides and angels, and
people can often mix them up.
Here is the formula:
ALL ANGELS ARE SPIRIT GUIDES
NOT ALL SPIRIT GUIDES ARE ANGELS!
(Go to Article)
_______________________
It is a Wonderful
Life Indeed
By Kris Faso
....... as all thought subsides, I sink
deeper into my being and expand
outward. Eventually I transcend the
space, as my weight merges within the environment. It is at that moment of
expanding all my senses, that I notice
my Spirit, and I see I am not alone.
There, on either side of me, sit two
(familiar) Spirit guides.A third Spirit,
as I was told, was a Teller -
a Teacher Spirit.
(Go to Article)