the circus of dr. lao

home. home with my dust rag caressing the legs and crevices of furniture i 
remember being small enough to look under, pieces of this memory and that, 
crawling up and around and under, of course, and my heart leaps...alive. i 
breathe in this circus--how does one forget the spring? wrapped in 
satin...i do believe. in everything, in the angel boy...the mermaid had to 
go to new york first...i have a reason to be where i am. and my 
grandparents with good hearts rattle off the benefits of working this job 
and that and i close my ears to them and shut off my eyes--they mean well, 
but the destiny of life cannot be found in any amount of these little 
green pieces of paper (it's only an illusion by the men behind the curtain 
that money makes you more free...in truth, the more you have, the more of 
a slave you are, to this universe, and to THEM) or any amount of comfort 
and definitely any amount of misery. life is laughter. life is lilacs. the 
bright lavendar lilacs in the front yard i never noticed before this 
year--and the strange orange tulips expanding with bright sepal arms in 
explanation "look at me! look at me!" new draperies and another stitch in 
that blue quilt--putting my life back in order next door, rearranging the 
hemispheres, shoving this closet into that bookcase...my place doesn't 
define me-- i define myself. and i can decide when spring happens. and i 
can just live, because life is the most delicious apple in the world, 
hanging in the top basket above the zinc, and life is making spagetti and 
cornbread, and life is watching the radishes and snowpeas make their first 
appearances, and life is barefoot, and life is redbuds and dogwoods, and 
life is a nice warm fire and toasty toes, and life is penstrokes in an 
angel's journal, and life is trying to dye easter eggs black, and 
life--life is a miracle, a mystery, a marvel. life is the circus of dr. 
lao and all his seven faces. the magic of merlin, the joy of pan, the 
sorrow of appolonius, the wickedness of medusa, the crude honesty of the 
giant serpent, the silliness of the abominable snowman, the unexpected 
loch ness monster goldfish... try a hat on for size, still they all fit. 
and you can't find that kind of wisdom in any book or any theory--life 
isn't like that. it's about chaos and entropy. it's about patterns and 
structure. it's about every single little thing falling in place as if it 
were choreographed....

and it's about love.

and believing.

and i do believe in you.

"every time you pick up a handful of dust
and see not the dust,
but a mystery--a marvel--right there in your hand...
then you are part of the circus of doctor lao."