The small ritual

placing things here

attending with water

adding cleansing agents

rinsing while ordering my world

anew with each breath

of this morning

setting things just so

 

I think of my friend

and how she doesn’t reach out

at least not that I know of

perhaps ordering her world

just so, attending with

what I can only guess at

but still ordering her world

whether it’s apparent or not

 

Which brings me to

the question, the heart of it

as I ask many questions,

each being a facet of the one,

what calls me to pause

in concern (is it concern?)

in a wish for her (what is my wish?)

to find the deepening element

 

That which has its own way

of upsetting the cart, which

carries it all: hers, mine,

yours, ours, and what is

not any of these

Another question filters in,

is it peripheral or the very heart,

as what can be carried is surely external

 

Returning to the kitchen

another cup of tea is poured

My friend perhaps wakes now

almost a thousand miles away

The question is a living vein of

vitality, ardor, nuance –a distillery

extracting the purity of the disturbed,

the trace minerals of this Ancient Now