race on before the storm. Off turn-of-the-century ragged glass negatives.

Off overcast Connecticut. Gaffing wind like you first did along the Nile. 

Tacking through elemental turbulence—pushed against, even as you’re buoyed. Unlike the world’s first sailboat that only took Anthony and Cleopatra downwind, we’ll hoist a halyard of woven questions strong enough to sail hauled tight in any squall. With fear battened down we’ll tact through psychic crosswinds. Chart between reefs using relational wisdom. 

Silvered shadows stretch

the abandoned antique

glass negatives my friend 

unearthed in his barn. Won

in a silent auction for Alia’s

Guest House she named, 

after a Rumi poem that says:

      “being human is a guest house.

      Meet the dark thought—the shame,

      the malice—at the door    laughing.

      Be grateful, for whoever arrives

is a guide from beyond. 

Alia lit retreats with mountainous

presence. Gazing along my shelf, 

she puzzles life out outrageously.