1.
Pause in the noise. I don’t know how I am interlaced with anyone else. Every connection is fragile and tenacious. I’m forced to be minimal, connected and present in this relentlessly beautiful life. Attend, notice, fall in love. We’re here together. It’s not worth loving smaller than this.
2.
Out my front window, our weeping birch is bare, the grass is nearly finished dying for the winter, there’s snow-lace edging where the lawn and sidewalk meet. Who will make up a word for the late-September dance of cold air along my cheek? Isn’t that as important as anything else?
The seasons don’t worry about originality. I want to walk the same trail every day until each leaf is my neighbor, and we can talk about how the creek has plans to renovate its shore again this spring.
The air has lilacs, raven wings, cut grass. I’m sure I heard a blue jay call from a tree that giggled in the wind. Shadows tread around my house, a meditation labyrinth for sunny hours. I trace tendrils of hops around a string. Remember: the air has me, too.
3.
Beauty may not save me, but perhaps the definition of “save” is flexible. Sometimes, in a week with too many days, I feel a tickle of joy marching along the edge of my wrist like a ladybug, small & red & round & demanding of pause. Just dropping in to say hello, I’m glad you’re here.
I have to understand—it all belongs. Dark moments inside beauty and quiet. In the field behind my house, the rising January sun slants the snow the coldest pink I’ve seen in years. This cold, coded deep in my most reptilian synapses. This is home.
Author’s Note: In 2019, I was struggling with my dad’s recent death, a major move, parenting struggles, and general upheaval. I made a project of posting tiny poems on Twitter with the theme #QuietBeautiful2019. This is the best of the collection, posted here for archival purposes. They’re arranged in reverse chronological order, because sometimes walking backwards is what makes the most sense.