Poem: October 23, 2019

Containers

Everyone must leave something behind when he dies . . . Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die . . . It doesn't matter what you do, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that's like you after you take your hands away.

-- Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

And where will my soul reside?

In my children.

Riley, kind and clever, 
self-principled, generous,
passionate and present,
with capable hands
to hold a soul.

Annie, bright and curious,
driven to mastery, wise,
adept and insightful,
with a wide-ranging mind
to understand a soul.

Sophia, artful and open
to the world, expressive, 
humane and empathetic,
with a vibrant heart 
to celebrate a soul.

Or in my home.

Built of friendship and
commitment to all the
compromises we make
to one another with 
joyous faith, even with
all our mistakes, we make
our daily gifts to love, 
to the bones of home,
the chores and renovations,
the corners and textures,
the echos, the spice
of time together. Our
shared and single spot,
our frame through which we 
watch as seasons pass.

Or in my work.

And in the gifts I give
of time, the systems and
spaces I create for learners,
children and adults, the bits
of self I leave behind me,
the sparks and structures,
the architecture of learning, 
the tools we sharpen 
together and pass down.
The ideas I go to war against,
the ideas I stand beside. 
Promises to the world
I will one day leave behind.

Or on the page.

An assembly, a chorus
of the thoughts that pass and
matter, a collection,
selected along a path, 
a song of self, an epitaph.
scratched in ink, tapped out
into the world. My best guess
at meaning, or at least
a willingness to notice.