To a Shy, Walking Hero

When I was growing up, I had only one hero. He was a big man, with big hands that were gentle and strong. He blocked the sun that he said rose and set on my head from the second I was born. Then at night, he hung the moon, to make sure I had a light to guide me home.

It's damned hard to find heroes who live up to that.

I've found a few, a handful -- boys and girls, women and men -- humans who were more than good, who understood humanity, joy, life, generosity, and in end, unconditional love.

I look with gratitude to a universe that has given me so many heroes. My eyes fill with the emotion of knowing that we are all of the stars. When I'm alone, every one of them sits in the leather chair I don't own, in the den of my imagination. They read. I write. They sleep. I reflect. We breathe the same air on the same planet.

Some things in life you just know. That I know.

I dance on a beach for the heroes I have known. I walk pressing my feet in the sand under a sky only a universe could display. Hearing the water rush, hearing my heart pump, hearing the silent breeze, I sometimes see the hero in me. Mostly, I don't feel alone.

Once you have known a hero, that hero finds a home in your heart. That I know.

I write a soft, grateful thought to a shy, walking hero. I think my way back to believing in a world that turns in harmony. I stand tall under a blue sky in a universe that will not be thwarted, in a universe where people and stars still shine and sometimes even sparkle.

It's damned hard to find heroes.
One star shined for me today.
That I know.

--me strauss Letting me be

That Line No One Should Be Crossing

I don't know when I discovered it. Most people have never seen it.

A few folks suspect it's there. That line no one should be crossing.

Don't cross that line, please. I didn't draw it there.

But that line is me and I'll make sure that you stay where you should be.

Some folks have said to me they suspect the line exists.

Most of the time I wonder whether I've only imagined it.

Not today. No not today. You made the line light up and shine.

Don't cross the line, please. I didn't draw it there.

But that line is me.

That line is me.

Few folks suspect it's there. That line no one should be crossing.

--me strauss Letting me strauss

Straight Line

She said, "In all of the time that I've known you, I've never seen you walk in a straight line."

Funny, it feels differently to me.

Though I know the truth of what she said. It's so true. It's almost freeing to hear it, to know someone sees it, to not have to hide it.

Oh, but oh. Does anyone know? Could anyone feel, understand, or comprehend how hard, how desperately I tried it. I put one foot in front of the other. I stood with them together. The lines just kept moving. The lines never made sense to me. They broke and twisted. They twirled and turned.

It seemed so unnatural to try make a line that was perfectly straight. Not a twig or tree ever grew that way. Not ripple in the water ever took that shape. No thought in my mind could stay that disciplined, organized, or boringly, depressingly ordinary.

Or -din-ary.

It's the exceptional, the accidental, the tiniest flaw that steals my wonder. It's the static on my mind that explodes into new ideas. The silence of straight lines puts my thoughts to deep, deep sleep.

If I only walked in straight line, I would always be walking away.

--me strauss Letting me be

Juxtaposition of color

A life is a juxtaposition of colors. So many light waves colliding and finding a way to make meaning during our days. A moment happens we capture it, and it places itself next to another. Together the two seem to say something. But maybe like breathing they are just what happened. Maybe events just topple upon one another.

My life is a juxtaposition of color in my head.

When I try to sort through the color I find it blends into so many shades, so many feelings. How can possibly say anyone of them has any single important cause, any lyrical inspiration. I wonder whether everything I am is just a function of the chemicals set free and shot through my brain.

Shake my world and you re-juxtapose the colors.

Let an idea be formed. It will make colors before it is said. Anger will pull forward shades of red to orange. Childhood will bring sky blue, grass green and sunshine yellow. College opens gray stone and brick red. Dancing and playing bring all of the purples and all of the gold that I've ever imagined could dress a flower. Thoughts of the moon or motherhood bring indigo black with warm back light of blue.

And my dad, my dad, brings all of the colors in every wavelength of the seen and unseen spectrum. They are all dancing in a kaleidoscope made by his powerfully gentle hands.

Unconditional love is the most beautiful juxtaposition of all.

--me strauss Letting me be

Floating Flower

Like a floating flower, I'm not quite sure where I stand. My feet aren't touching the ground. Where are you?

I float, open and waiting.

Is this the way I was meant to be?

Like a floating flower in a sea of inky black. I have nothing to tie me down and nothing to hold me up.

I am open. I let the waiting float away.

I float free. I am a flower floating.

--me strauss Letting me be

Red to Orange

Look out the window. The sky is gray over the harbor. The sailboats sit so lonely, rocking there. I'm left alone with my thoughts. Alone again. It's a familiar spot.

My childhood bedroom had my parent's wedding furniture. It was the most amazing mahogany stained to a light oak shade. The wood grain moved and swirled. When I was alone, I'd run my childish finger along the lines that were my bed's headboard, imagining they were a road.

The villages, the people. I populated an entire fantasy world.

Everyone worked hard. No one was tired. They sang and smiled. Life was good. Life was more than good, but I didn't know that.

From village to village, I'd go to visit the friends that I'd made in each one.

They were life. They were living. Who was to say they were less real than the people in the next room were?

And in the villages, they couldn't see when in my mind I'd change the universe. On joyful days, I'd see the wood in shades of purple. On quiet days, it would be blues to greens. Rarely there would be yellows. On angry, lonely days I'd see it go from red to orange.

Red to orange. How I remember that feeling.

Anger is a lonely place.

--me strauss Letting me be

Down the Hallways

Sometimes my life seems like a open road, I'm in control of everything. Flowers bloom by side of a paved country road. Every now and then a pond glimmers in the sunshine.

Nothing could be more fine on a breezy summer day when I have nothing else on my mind. Nothing could fill me better. Nothing more could lighten my eyes or lift my cares away than a mental walk down my road.

Everyone has a road. It's theirs, of their own making. Everyone can go down their road any old time.

So why do I sometimes find myself walking down that hall that closes me inside? Halls are interesting, even those where the doors are artfully juxtaposed inside, inside, inside, and inside. And I keep thinking that the sky is outside. Outside is where I go to wonder and play.

I touch the wood walls. I slide my feet along the smooth floors. I hear my voice echoing as I whisper to remember my name. It's my name. It's my name. I say that over and over and over. Finally I reach the very last door.

When I walk through, I find . . . . the meaning of my life.

It doesn't matter, it wouldn't look the same to you.

But for me there is the most marvelous night sky in which I can see my name.

Heaven knows we're alive.
--,me strauss Letting me be

People called her Daisy

I only had one child. He only had one mother.

Dear older, older brother,
I'm thinking about our mother. I've grown to become much like her. I'm like the woman who was your mother. Your mother was different from my mother.

A little girl who died after nine days changed her.

One woman, she was, but she was two mothers. She was the one before and the one after. The sense of loss never quite left her.

Dear older, older brother,
Do you know how lucky you were to have known her? I can see her heart from here. She was a flower reaching for the sun,. She was strength and intuition. She so loved her children. She knew wo many things. She was stubborn, feisty, and a force to deal with.

I am a child of her gene pool. I am a mother like her. But I had a different mother.

My mother was older, sadder, and farther. I had to reach to find her.

I have one son. He has one mother.
Or do I? Or does he?

We never really meet our parents until they leave us.

People called her Daisy.

--me strauss Letting me be

Raise the Sky

Everyone has been here. If you have not, are you alive? The sky comes low, and I feel the pressure. I'm bone tired. I wonder what it's like to die.

Who wants the sky down like a ceiling? Dark and low, overhead, it's not my friend. The colors so far off are holding my fire, my feelings. I need to raise the sky off my head.

The air is pressing in on me.

I stretch a bit to make me taller. The clouds respond with an upward move. A breeze begins. It's just light one, but a tiny hair tickles my face. I see a glimpse of light upon it. I feel a sparkle in my eye. I stand that little bit taller. The clouds again respond by moring high.

They say we make the weather. I've never tried to make it rain. I went for snowfall at midnight on Christmas eve once. Sure enough it really came. Yet, who'd have thought, when I was feeling pressured, that all I had to do was raise the sky?

--me strauss Letting me be

Mystical Mysteries

Another anniversary of the day that you were born. I think on the world. I think of my father. I think of the sky and trees.

The world is wonder waiting for you to conquer it. You'll turn it to serve you and you'll end up serving back. Folks will delight, destroy, and disarm your best laid plans. Friends will move on. You'll wonder where they went. One or two will stay to be always friends.

I'll sit in the audience holding a net for you. I sit hoping that you fly and never need me.

You're deciding things, making a place in society, walking the path with wise men, walking the path with fools. You always did too much thinking.

Please don't worry. You have all you need. You never needed me. No, not really. You are a powerful presence like a deep, dark tree on a lavendar, pink morning. You stand vigilant when the others run. That's your secret weapon. Then you smile knowingly with a sweetness that captures a heart.

I sit thinking how lucky the world is to know you.

The world is filled with wonder and mystical mysteries . . . I'm filled with the mystery and wonder of you.

--me strauss Letting me be