Meg, Meg, you visit my mind sometimes.We met 
when you floated in for sixth grade, from NYC 
to our Ivy League green grass town. A breath of fresh air 
that felt like salvation. 
We took ballet lessons, and crushed on Nureyev, 
listened to music and teenage-loved the lead singers. 
By tenth grade, and real boyfriends, you departed, 
leaving me to navigate arid sands of conformity.
 
Where are you Fox? Feral,
sleek-furred, four-time acquaintance, encountered on my walks.
First meeting, fleeting seconds, barely seemed real.
Long enough for our connection, 
through the eyes, arriving at primal understanding.

Separated, but still friends, we graduated college, 
You studied ways of tracker and herbalist, 
I found love with an artist, 
until, after four years, lost him to illness, 
caused by a virus, that set me on a journey 
to survive. Only by good fortune, science, 
and the slimmest of odds am I alive.

Thrilled when we’d meet again, after fourth time, Fox,
I called you my friend. I’ve looked for you since then,
hoping for reunion; to share our faces. It seems you’ve left 
for other places. And I, still here, behind. 

In our thirties, Meg, we rejoined. Talked 
of herbal tinctures and Ayurvedic ways. You, happily 
an Aunt. You and husband opened the bakery. You came
to the shower for my baby; to my wedding. Life was busy. But, 
pregnant with second child, I was to loose you, my friend, once more. 
Dear Meg, you didn’t survive cancer. 
I’d attempted a hospital visit…but you eluded me. 

Brave and creative dancer, I didn’t get to say goodbye. 
But, inspired by your touch of wild spirit, I walk; I sing.
                        

Large bears walk-floating 
through a mist.
Big lumbering figures moving 
as if weightless. 
Through haze, in line, in step, slow-motion, 
forward leaning; moving…where?
Bears, she thinks, what, what are you doing? 
What is the meaning?

Second dream is at a shore. Calm, flat ocean 
sparkles. Graceful beings of good will arcing 
through water, like dolphin; playful, peaceful.
My sister and her oldest best friend hold hands, 
run toward the swells, but they now rise up 
into towering dark waves. The friendly creatures morph
into pincer-clawed crabs. The friends are warned 
of change underfoot by a woman who sees it, calling: 
The hole has changed!
The hole? The whole! A paradigm shift…

Sands seething around ankles, grains drifting 
under feet, sifting through toes, swirled by eddies, inlets, 
floes…how to adjust; hold steady; remain able?
We can be clumsy, lumbering heavy-coated and big-pawed.
Can we learn to be buoyant, like bears who swim; 
find fluidity required to ride a transforming tide…
Our world churns. In the midst of the whorl,
are we at all learning… grace?

I ask, Was there a rainbow?