Beneath the Lichen: The Return

Beneath the Lichen: To look closely at lichen is to witness a symbiosis of fungi, bacteria, and algae woven together into something entirely new and magical. In this series, I invite you into the space behind my writing process. Beneath the Lichen pulls back the surface to reveal the personal stories, folklore, and lived moments that anchor my poetry. I am deeply honored to have you here reading it.

A few days ago, I posted a poem in response to Mary Oliver’s poem “Shadows”. Mary’s poem reads like this:

Oh, Mary. I love the way that she takes these forces of nature and faces the reality of them exactly as they are. She does not downplay the loss or destruction: “I don’t mean there are no bodies in the river, or bones broken by the wind”—she describes it very clearly, haunting in its simplicity. She acknowledges the questions that we all ask as we try to make meaning out of tragedy and chaos. In the end, she leads us back to the AND of it all; that things happen that are out of our control, and yet we go on, sometimes with broken hearts, in the resilient way that humans who live in and among the rest of creation do.

A few nights ago, I had the opportunity to attend a lovely gathering of poets who have been participating in the Dreamwork project from Poetry Outdoors. One of the questions Ash posed at the end was about what this practice has been bringing to us. For me, reading Mary’s words is like a permission-slip to live in the in-between. It is a permission to call things as they are, both the devastating and the wonderful, and to slow down enough to see them clearly. Often, I just want to write about the beauty of this place, even while everything is burning, and gloss over the harder parts because everything here on this earth is already hard. But Mary Oliver does both, and as I journey on, I find myself doing both as well.

Last week, I was able to take a few days away with my mother and my daughter to travel to the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens. My mom has been finding as many of Thomas Dambo’s trolls as she can, and the gardens held 5 of them! The days away were a beautiful reset for my nervous system. The weather was warmer but lovely. My daughter pulled me across the lawn of our cabin to watch the most glorious sunset over Boothbay Harbor one evening. We traveled so well together—each of us empathic givers, a sweet symbiotic thread where no one had to give too much.

As the mother of an autistic child, it is easy to forget how often my nervous system is in hyper-vigilant mode. My child is a treasure, and he brings immense joy and light to my life; yet our life as a family looks different from others. It requires something more. That isn’t a complaint, or even something I want to change; it is simply a fact of our lives at this point in time.

On the last day, my daughter and I headed home to our community services’ yearly party, held at a campground complete with food, swimming, games, and dancing. Because my daughter and I were traveling, our family of four arrived later than we planned. If you are a parent of a child with particular needs, or a person with particular needs, you may know that timing is everything. Some of the food had already been put away, and the swimming time ended an hour early (though we did get to swim!). All of these things are disappointing, and disappointment can be difficult, so there were some loud, jarring reactions.

My nervous system wasn’t prepared for such a rapid reintegration, and I was filled with deep feelings as I finally settled into bed. That is where I began to pen my poem, “The Return,” in response to Mary Oliver’s “The Shadows.” If you want to read it, you can find it here. I wanted to convey that specific grief of a nervous system finally finding rest and adjusting back to life again. As Mary said, “it is never the opposite of love.”

I loved all of the responses on “The Return”. I am so glad that it brought so many of you the peace that being back in Maine (another return) brought me.

I appreciate everyone who takes the time to read my words. Thank you. ⋆˙⟡♡