A Branch

A Branch

By Dave

A branch

Broken in a storm

Gently falls to the earth.

Pocket Spoon

Pocket Spoon

By Dave

I carry little that is not a question.

A notebook. A pen. A road not yet decided.

And now, this small spoon, shaped by a friend’s patient hand,

curved like the margin of a page

waiting to be filled.

It rests beside my journal

as if it, too, were keeping record—

of roadside coffee, of campfire stew,

of the quiet sacrament of ordinary days

that pass unannounced yet refuse to be forgotten.

A traveler learns quickly

that usefulness is a form of grace.

What we carry shapes what we notice.

A spoon teaches attention:

to warmth held briefly,

to hunger answered simply,

to the humility of enough.

Wood remembers the tree,

and the hand remembers the friend.

Between them, I move—

crossing distances that can be measured

only in shared meals and written lines.

So I keep this small companion near,

not as ornament but as promise:

that wherever I go,

friendship will arrive before me,

already waiting at the table.

Rest (1905)

Every day that passes, Grandma grows quieter, as though the world around her has begun to dim while an inner world brightens in compensation. She speaks less, reaches out less, and her eyes, once so quick to orient toward a new presence in the room, now drift toward some interior horizon. She is still here—unmistakably, beautifully here—but turned slightly away, as if listening to something beyond my range of hearing. In these subtle withdrawals I see the same gesture Hammershøi captured in Rest: a back turned not in rejection but in transformation, the opening of a threshold that none of us can cross alongside her.

It is in witnessing this slow turning-away that my own belief structure has been tested, stretched, and, unexpectedly, strengthened. I have long lived without belief in an afterlife. I do not imagine heaven or hell waiting past the edge of consciousness. I do not think of angels or judgment or a continuation of self in any literal sense. Yet death, especially death that arrives slowly enough to watch it unfold, presses against these convictions. Not because they are fragile, but because they demand to be lived, not merely reasoned. It is one thing to assert that existence ends; it is another to hold the hand of someone you love as that ending approaches and feel the ache of wanting more for them. Wanting more comfort, more assurance, more continuation than a secular worldview can easily promise.

And yet, it is precisely this tension that has deepened my connection to life. For without belief in an afterlife, I have had to locate meaning here, in these days, in these breaths, in the small gestures of care that shape the vigil. Without a supernatural horizon, the moral and emotional weight of presence intensifies. What I offer Grandma is not a bridge to the next world but companionship in this one. And that is enough. More than enough, it is profound.

In this sense, my beliefs are not diminished but clarified. I believe in rest. Rest not as a euphemism for continued existence but as a culminating state, a final easing of the body’s long labor. Rest is the body’s last truth. The final lyric of a life fully sung. I believe in grace, not as divine favor but as the human capacity to meet suffering with tenderness. And I believe in love, not because it outlives us, but because it saturates the time we are given.

In the days before Grandma retreated into this quiet inwardness, she spoke of visitors: her sister, the children. Someone asked me if I believed they were truly here, waiting to usher her into an afterlife. My first response was no, because I do not imagine such realms. But that answer was incomplete. For Grandma, these visitors are not metaphors. They are companions rising from the deep well of memory, the psyche, the emotional landscapes built over decades. They are the architecture of her inner world. They are artifacts of love, grief, and continuity. And in that sense, they are here to shepherd her not into heaven, but into peace. Into Rest. 

Reconciliation, then, is not about refashioning my worldview to fit someone else’s metaphysics. It is about realizing that subjective experience at the end of life is its own truth. If Grandma finds solace in the presence of her sister—real in memory, real in mind, real in heart—then that reality is sufficient. What matters is not ontological accuracy but emotional resonance. She is comforted. She is not alone. And that is a kind of grace I can believe in wholeheartedly.

My vigil has become a kind of prayer, though not in the theological sense. I understand prayer as a form of art: a human craft that transforms fear into form and grief into gesture. Sitting with her, I am shaping my own grief into presence. Into breath. Into waiting. Prayer is not spoken but enacted: a posture of attentiveness. And in this, I feel closer to life, not further from it. The vigil teaches me to see the flame of living not as something fragile, threatened by the dark, but as something self-limiting, something that naturally lowers when its work is done.

This brings me back to the Buddha’s image of the flame. In early Buddhist thought, nirvāṇa is often described as the extinguishing of a candle. A candle not snuffed out by force, but simply ceasing when the fuel is gone. The flame does not “go” anywhere; it stops because its conditions have been fulfilled. This image has settled into me with unexpected comfort. Grandma is not being taken or separated or judged. She is not vanishing into nothingness. She is completing a process. The flame is lowering, thinning, preparing to rest in its own stillness.

Confronting death from within my secular commitments has not weakened them. Instead, it has revealed their depth. Without the cushion of an afterlife, I am forced to confront the full weight of temporality. And yet, paradoxically, this has not made death more frightening. For me, it has made life more luminous. Every gesture of care becomes more consequential. Every memory more cherished. Every hour by Grandma’s bedside more sacred.

My connection to my family has deepened as well. We sit together in the shared labor of love, each of us holding a corner of the vigil. My father’s steadiness, my mother’s compassion, my brother’s presence, even my ex-wife's tender kisses on Grandma's forehead and hands all form a constellation of care around Grandma, a living testament to the world she shaped. In witnessing her life’s last chapter together, we discover not only the depth of our grief but also the depth of our bond.

What Hammershøi offers me through Rest is not an answer but a posture. The turned back is a reminder that some parts of the journey must be taken alone, even by those we love most. But it also reminds me that accompaniment does not require visibility. Sometimes love sits behind the chair, within the quiet, in the steady warmth of simply being present.

In learning to reconcile death with my own beliefs, I have not found heaven. I have found humanity. I have found the fierce beauty of finite life. I have found the grace of turning toward someone even as they turn away from the world and from me. And in that turning, I have found a deepened reverence for living. For its fragility, its mystery, its tenderness, and its final rest.

Coda

In learning to reconcile death within my own beliefs, I have not found heaven, but I have found something grounded and profoundly human: a reverence for life as it is lived and as it ends. Grandma’s quiet withdrawal has clarified what it means to love without needing metaphysics to complete the picture. Her turning-away has drawn me closer—to my family, to her, and to the fragile miracle of presence itself. And if this vigil is a kind of prayer, then let that prayer take its final shape in words as an offering not of faith in the supernatural, but of faith in love, memory, and rest.

As You Turn Away, A Prayer for Grandma

By Dave

May the world grow softer

as you turn away,

each sound thinning to a whisper,

each shadow settling into gentleness.

May the memories that visit you

arrive like familiar footsteps

in a room you have always known.

Your sister’s voice,

the children’s laughter,

all the quiet anchors

of the life you shaped.

May your body find its ease

in the slow unwinding of breath.

May every sorrow loosen

its hold on you,

guilt dissolving,

forgiveness rising

like a warm hand in yours.

May you feel us near,

our vigil steady,

our hearts unhardened,

as we keep the light low

and speak to you

in the language of presence.

And when your flame lowers

to its final glow,

may it do so without fear,

without struggle,

simply completing its work

in the quiet way

a life does

when it has given all it can.

Go gently, Grandma.

Turn toward your rest.

We are here.

We will hold you

as you drift into stillness.

You are loved

beyond measure.

Amen

Cats, Coffee, and Roses

My favorite things in three poems. 

By Dave

Cats

In the window light
a tail moves once,
then stillness.

Coffee

Steam drifts.
A small ring darkens
the page.

Roses

Some open early,
some not at all.
Bees decide.

Rose in the Rain

Rose in the Rain

By Dave

The sand is an ocean without mercy.

For forty days it has named me Son.

Each grain a whisper of what I must become.

I asked for bread and was given silence.

I asked for light and was given fire.

I asked for God—

and the wind answered wait.

Then a rose grew in the stone.

No water, no root, only will.

Its red bled against the pale of the world,

a wound that refused to close.

I knelt before it.

It smelled of both heaven and rot,

and I knew the kingdom would be the same.

Temptation came not as the serpent

but as the bloom—

beauty promising meaning,

color promising truth.

I touched its thorns and felt my blood begin.

“Is this how You speak?” I asked.

And the sky broke open.

Rain—

first a single drop,

then the whole heaven collapsing.

It filled my mouth like a name I had forgotten.

It washed the rose into the earth,

and me with it.

I could not tell if I was saved or undone.

Only that God was in the rain,

and the world was beginning again.

The Grasshopper in the Rose

The Grasshopper in the Rose

By Dave

I hopped into a rose at dawn,

enchanted by her hue,

the kind of red that poets praise

and liars, they call “true.”

She whispered, “Mind the thorns, my dear,”

with half a sigh, half smile;

I swore my heart was armor-proof—

it lasted but a while.

I spoke of moonlit meadows,

of songs the crickets know,

she spoke of fleeting beauty,

and how blossoms come and go.

We danced a minute, maybe two,

before the sunlight grew.

She wilted into memory—

as all red roses do.

Now every time I see one bloom,

I bow, but never close,

for love’s a lovely landing spot,

but cruel on tender toes.

Red

Red

By Dave

I reached for a rose.

A thorn caught my thumb.

Blood rose where I touched it.

For a moment,

the red of both

was the same.

I held it anyway,

then let it fall.

Pain and beauty

share a color.

Self Portrait 43

Self Portrait 43

By Dave

Mirror eyes, mirror eyes,

round glass circles, bald dome hum,

beard heavy as a cathedral door.

Every line a ledger, every hair a tally—

Who are you?

Forty-three.

Divorced.

Never a dad.

Traveler, teacher, journeyman of chalk dust and coffee rings.

Forty-three.

Half a tank of gas through this highway called life,

still stopping at small-town museums,

still scribbling journals in dim light,

still chasing Hopper’s shadows, Turner’s storms,

Who are you?

Phones buzzing buzzing buzzing.

Kids high, kids crying, kids fists clenched.

Trauma dripping from the walls.

And out in the hall—

fire trucks, EMTs, superintendent in his polished shoes.

But me?

I don’t even know.

I’m inside the storm,

ADHD,

PowerPoints for a doctoral seminar I’m supposed to lead.

Authority, they call it—

but what does authority mean

when a mother clutches two children like life preservers?

Who are you? 

Ink under skin,

roses blooming on the arm,

a compass, a ship,

Bars etched in black and shade.

The body a manuscript,

each scar a footnote,

each rose a confession.

Who are you? 

Baseball bats like relics in a roadside shrine.

Brother at my side,

stadiums stitched like a quilt:

Toledo, Lansing, Busch, Kauffman.

Kissing bricks at Indy,

cracking beers in Toledo.

Life not in innings but in echoes,

scoreboard ticking forward

even when I scream for time to stop.

Who are you? 

Cats—soft fur prophets,

biscuits in my lap,

purring like monks in prayer.

Tiny gods of comfort,

never asking for permission to be,

only that I stay still long enough to be chosen.

Who are you? 

Raised Baptist.

“For the Bible tells me so” meant

“For the pastor tells me so.”

Faith burned down to ash,

smoke in the rafters.

Apologists talk revelation,

I see syncretism.

I read Paul.

I read Seneca.

I wrestle with Jacob under Doré’s angel.

Science is my steady flame—

not answers,

just sharper questions.

Who are you?

Teacher.

Conditional redemption.

Students stumbling, breaking, fighting.

Mothers waiting in offices,

children clutching arms.

Redemption always fragile,

always conditional,

but I stand at that edge with them.

That edge is holy ground.

Who are you? 

So who am I?

Divorced, never-dad,

traveler, teacher, inked-up believer in doubt,

halfway through this cracked-open life.

Self-portrait staring back—

and still, still, still I ask:

Who are you?

Who are you?

Who are you?

Maybe the question itself,

scratched in black lines,

is the only true answer.

Maybe the asking

is the only true self-portrait.

Who are you? 

A Single Petal

A Single Petal

By Dave 

A single petal

falls upon the morning grass—

nothing is broken.

Every blossom in its time

shows the face of perfection.

Kitty Biscuits

Kitty Biscuits

By Dave

Paws go pat, the dough goes squish,

Baking up your every wish.

Whisker chefs with tails that twirl,

Biscuits made for every girl!

Tuna tarts and salmon pies,

Cookies shaped like butterflies.

Every purr adds sugar sweet,

Warm and cozy, best to eat!

Flour flying, ovens glow,

Kitties knead in steady rows.

Step right up, come grab a seat—

Kitty Biscuits can’t be beat!

Chimes

Chimes 

by Dave

Wind whispers,

notes that paint the air with longing,  

her breath a brush across my silence.  

I sway at her passing,  

each tone a soft caress,  

a song that lingers on my lips,  

and then she is gone,  

leaving me to echo alone.

Napping with Cats

Napping with Cats

by Dave

I settled in for a noble nap,

A midday drift, a dreamy gap.

But comfort, it would seem, must wait—

The Ruling Council had set their date.

First came Cricket, silver queen,

A regal blur of stately sheen.

She leapt with grace upon my chest,

Then sighed, as if to say, “You jest?”

Next, Hopper crept with hunting ease—

No prey, just toes beneath the fleece.

She claimed my shin, then tucked her head,

And made my blanket her homestead.

Louie followed, bold and wide,

With all the charm of youthful pride.

He flopped along my outstretched arm,

Purring chaos, warm and calm.

Three cats in place. I could not move.

A muscle twitched—they did not approve.

They formed a pile, a purring fort,

A furry siege with no retort.

But then—a cry! A squeak! A wail!

From downstairs came a kitten’s tale.

The baby Betty, newest face,

Proclaimed her need for love and space.

The Council froze. Their ears shot high.

“What is that sound?” said Hopper, wry.

“A coup?” asked Cricket. “She’s too small.”

Louie just blinked. “She’s got some gall.”

They disassembled, one by one,

Their royal nap was now undone.

Down they stalked with tails held firm—

To inspect this bold, gray tuxedo worm.

And me? Alone, still in repose,

But now alert from head to toes.

For peace is brief and naps are rare

When four cats rule your favorite chair.

The Sentinel

The Sentinel

By Dave

A Songbird, On a withered Limb, 
Observed, the Canyon’s Scroll, 
Its Pages, writ in Dust and Time, 
A Testament, of Soul. 

It did not Stir, nor beckon Sky, 
Its Vigil, stern, and Still, 
As if the Silence, held its Breath, 
And bent, unto its Will. 

The Layers, like a Painter’s Dream, 
Lay folded, in the Deep, 
A Crimson, Wound, that does not Bleed, 
But holds, what Earth shall Keep. 

No Choir, save the Wind’s soft Hymn, 
No Church, but Ridge and Stone, 
Yet something Holy, stirred the Dust, 
And left me, not alone. 

Petrichor

Petrichor

By Dave

It begins

with stillness—

not absence,

but waiting,

the air dense

with what might fall.

A single drop—

hesitant,

testing

the curve of a leaf.

It tilts

toward it.

The hush deepens.

Then another—

then many—

and the rhythm stirs:

flesh of water

on bone of earth,

slow,

then surer,

then everywhere.

The soil breathes out—

a musk of root and stone,

of things kept

buried

until now.

Each scent is a signal.

Each sound a beckon.

The earth is damp with wanting

long before

the storm breaks.

Snow Crocus

Snow Crocus

By Dave

They come to my door with their tongues aflame,
Smoke curling like incense from each ostentatious syllable.
Eyes bright as struck flint, scattering sparks
Against the unyielding stone of my silence.

They call themselves seekers,
Yet don the threadbare garb of Sophists—
Robes stitched from borrowed philosophies,
Frayed at the hem by half-digested doctrines.

They invoke gods as if recalling old drinking companions,
Toast Epictetus over shallow musings, mock the Buddha
With ironic detachment and performative scorn,
Plucking wisdom like unripe fruit—
Bitter on the tongue, discarded before digestion.

With thumbs calloused by relentless scrolling,
They conjure prophets from the dim glow of TikTok reels,
Exchanging the rigor of Plato for the convenience of algorithms,
Proclaiming themselves sages between flickering notifications.

Their minds are bustling marketplaces of intellectual trinkets,
Bartering platitudes for profundity,
Trading in the counterfeit currency of echoes,
Never daring to mint a thought of original weight.

They quote Croesus' wealth with studied aplomb,
Then boast of cryptocurrency conquests in the same breath;
Viewing existence as a collection of life hacks and shortcuts,
Mistaking acceleration for enlightenment,
And attention for the hard-earned gravity of wisdom.

I administer no examinations.
The robin already sings the curriculum.
The rain composes homilies upon my eaves.
And the crocus—ah, the crocus—
Splits winter’s frost with nothing but grace.

The mountain does not shout its philosophy;
It waits with immutable patience for ears attuned to silence.
Yet they rattle on,
Their restless footsteps unskilled
In the sacred art of leaving quietly.

And so I remain,
The keeper of unopened doors,
Observing as they descend again into the valley,
Weighted by the sheer mass of their borrowed words,
Hollow still, and hungering for understanding.

I Think of You

I Think of You
By Dave

Do you think of me
when you sip your coffee
and the steam curls toward your face?
When you take the long way home
without knowing why?
When a song you didn’t mean to hear
lingers too long in your chest?

Do you think of me
when you reach for a thought
you can’t quite name—
when something’s missing
but you don’t know what?

Because I loved you.
From the moment I saw you,
before there were words
or reasons
or rules.

You were light still forming,
a kindness I did not deserve,
a future I was never meant to touch.

And I—
I was the one who knew.
Who counted the cost.
Who turned away
not because I didn’t feel it,
but because I did.

You didn’t know what you offered.
And I loved you more
for that.

So I became the silence.
The closed door.
The steady hand that let go
so you could walk free.

You may forget me.
You may go on
never knowing the truth.

But if ever—
in some quiet hour,
on some ordinary day—
you pause and wonder,
just wonder...

Then know:
I think of you.

The Feeding of a Stray Cat

The Feeding of a Stray Cat

By Dave

She came — a shadow — slight and spare,

With neither name nor plea —

A whisper curled beneath the stair,

Too soft for eyes to see.

I brought a bowl, I laid it low,

Where moonlight kissed the floor —

And though she fled — she’d come, 

I know —

Each dusk, and nothing more.

She wore the cloak that silence weaves,

With hunger at her side —

Her footfalls light as brittle leaves

The autumn winds would hide.

No song she sang, no trust she gave,

No thanks for meat or crumb —

Yet something stirred — a small, slow wave —

Each time I saw her come.

I knew her not by fur or name,

But by the ache she bore —

The kind that wanders just the same

Back to a stranger’s door.

And still I leave a bit of bread

Where hope might chance to be —

For even what the world calls dead

May dine — and live — with me.

Love Is Denial

Love Is Denial

By Dave

Love is denial—

a monk in his cell,

chanting a name

he must never tell.

A litany whispered

in hunger and dust,

his lips to the stone,

his heart to the rust.

It is silence made sacred,

a fast of the soul,

a hermit in his cave

scooping light from a hole.

It is choosing the cloister

though the door stands ajar,

tracing her shadow

in the shape of a star.

It is kneeling to ashes

and calling them grace,

washing the feet

of a memory’s face.

Love is the rule

not carved but endured,

a discipline tender,

a sickness uncured.

It is watching the dawn

yet praying for night,

guarding the candle

but shielding its light.

It is not the embrace,

but the still, open hand—

the vow in the dark

than none understand.

Love is denial—

not absence, nore lack,

but the turning away

and no turning back.

Man Reading (1904)

Man Reading: A Short Story

By Dave

He woke late to the soft gray of a rain-washed morning. No alarm. No obligations. Just the cats, stretched long and still beside him, their breathing slow as the rhythm of the storm outside. The house was quiet—peaceful, undisturbed. He moved without hurry, padding barefoot into the kitchen. The lights were still on then.

He brewed coffee using his French press, the glass fogging gently as the grounds bloomed and fell. He liked the ritual of it. The quiet dignity of making something for himself without the rush of need. He poured a mug and stepped onto the porch, holding the warmth in his hands while rain whispered across the yard. He placed a bowl of food out for Katy, his porch cat. She didn’t come, but he knew she’d find it. She had recently had kittens—hidden somewhere under a shed or inside the ivy, nursing in the hush of spring’s return.

Back inside, he sat with his coffee and opened his book—Stephen King’s Cell. The plot moved fast, but he read slowly, letting the tension stretch like the rain across the windows. Halfway through a chapter, the power flickered once. Then again. Then fell silent.

No hum. No lights. No show buzzing in the background. Just the sound of rain and the soft creak of the house settling. He took it as a sign. He set the book aside, stretched out on the couch, and let the stillness carry him into sleep. The cats joined without question, one tucked behind his knees, another curled in the crook of his arm. When he woke again, the sky outside had shifted. The light had changed.

The power was back.

He moved through the afternoon in slow turns. He made himself dinner—not rushed, not reheated. Something warm from scratch. He thought of how long it had been since he cooked for no reason but that he could. He cleaned the dish. Washed the French press. Moved quietly, like someone visiting his own life.

Later, he returned to his book. The couch welcomed him back into its familiar shape. The cats resumed their quiet guard. Outside, the rain softened. He flipped through the pages slowly, without guilt. He wasn’t reading for escape. He wasn’t reading to learn. He was reading to be still.

It reminded him of a painting—John Singer Sargent’s Man Reading. He hadn’t thought of it in years, but now the image was clear: a man slouched into a book, pipe resting forgotten in his mouth, utterly absorbed. Not performing reading. Being with it. That was what Sargent understood—that stories aren’t just consumed, they settle inside us. They shift the room. They shift us.

As twilight crept in, he stepped out onto the porch again. The rain had thinned to a hush. The wind chimes moved gently above him, catching a rhythm only they understood. He lit his pipe and sat back, watching the world continue at its own unhurried pace. Somewhere out there, Katy nursed her young, hidden in the safety of quiet shadows. He liked knowing that new life was near. That the world didn’t need his interference to go on being beautiful.

Rest, he thought, isn’t selfish. It’s sacred. Necessary. Rest is not idleness, he remembered reading once, but peace in motion. The brain needs slowness. The soul needs silence. He had given himself both today. Not as a reward. Not as escape. But as a return.

When he went inside for the last time, he sat down once more. Picked up the book. Turned another page. The light from the lamp curled around him like warmth. The cats sighed into sleep beside him. The story carried him forward, gently.

And as the final minutes of the day slipped away, he smiled to himself—content, unhurried, and fully, deeply present.

Sometimes, he thought, doing nothing is the most honest thing we can do.

Doldrums and Gales

Doldrums and Gales
By Dave

Doldrums and gales—
I am a ship at sea,
the wind my mercurial lover,
fickle as foam on the break.

She comes when she wills,
filling my canvas with hunger,
snapping halyards taut with need.
She moans in the rigging,
a shanty of salt and longing,
driving me broadside
against the compass of sense.

I heel under her touch,
keel slicing strange tides
charted only in dream.
She bears me toward mythic coasts,
past shoals unnamed,
past stars whose constellations
burn with unfamiliar stories.

But then—stillness.
No breeze in the stays,
no pressure in the sails.
Only the cruel intimacy
of the doldrums—
that windless paralysis
where desire hangs
like a gull over glass seas.

I trim the sheets in vain.
Even the capstan forgets its turning.
Each hour becalmed
is a confession.

And yet—
I would ballast my soul
with every silence she gives,
just for the brief exhale
of her return.

When she comes again—
and she always does—
she wears another face,
a new latitude of mood.
Sometimes a nor’easter,
all fury and white-knuckled helm.
Sometimes a sigh from the south,
barely enough to ghost the jib.

Still, I brace.
Still, I offer my prow,
bright as a prayer
and just as unanswered.

I am a vessel of longing,
forever rigged
for the next tempest or tease.

She is the wind.
And I,
her conscripted mariner,
sail by the grace
of her choosing.