August 26, 2010
Yesterday was Carolyn Hall Young's 57th birthday. Carolyn has been my friend, inspiration, and guide since we were fifteen years old. Through her art, her cooking, her words, her garden, and most of all through her love, she's taught me the true meaning of a life well lived. I've written about her in both my memoirs, altering her name just slightly.
Carolyn has lived the last twenty-plus years of her life with advanced-stage non-Hodgkins lymphoma. She's thrived despite unspeakable suffering and has shown me the true meaning and power of mindful awareness.
Although we're in different states and don't see each other often, Carolyn and I are constants in each other's life. Although I don't write much poetry, the following lines emerged this morning and seemed to have been written for her. I share them with you in the hope that a little of her magic might flow through them to you.
Like Water
For Carolyn on her Birthday
Pause when the pool has stilled.
Notice the texture at play,
A thousand emeralds suspended,
Gleaming above the below.
Notice the layers of heaven
Riding the motionless tide,
Inside, over, upside down,
In liquid as they are on air.
Now dip a single fingertip,
Quiet, steady, and slow.
Breaking the skin like a needle
That dares not leave a scar.
Press surely as a lover
Enters his virgin.
Exhale, hesitant, no, not yet.
Now, begin to withdraw.
First, attention must be paid.
Breathe in as the world
Lifts outward, in each circle
Of light, joy.
Aimee Liu
August 25, 2010
