PROOF
Drenched
Renée Gregorio

All day the long funnel
that makes speech between
my heart and my head
surged with anxious energy
as I moved among the bodies on the mat,
asking and being asked: what matters?

Later I held the wooden stick in my hands,
executed pieces of a kata
I spent all summer practicing—
ichi, ni, san, shi, go, roku, shichi, hachi—
and it streamed from my bones and my belly
like the river in the San Juan Mountains
flowed by our heads as we fell asleep listening
and rushed over rocks so we could hear it as we woke.

Then I said: The real tragedy would be
if the river stopped running,
if we woke and there was no water.

Later I knew I have the body for this.
Later he said, She is a Nidan.
How many times do I have to prove 
to myself that I exist?

The passion in my gut
wanted to rise to my vocal cords.
What I got instead was a churning
whirlpool, boulders that blocked
the water's flow so it swirled
around itself, going nowhere.

I want the trajectory of waterfall
when I speak, joy running down,
joy drenching me.  He pared my words down
to the barest statement, its simplest essence,
the mountain stream finding its source.

I raised the stick over my head,
cut it down, extended it out to those in my circle.
I told O'Sensei: Yes.

One purple hydrangea blossomed in the patio
outside the dojo as my teacher coached me
to say it straight, and I did:
I'm going to create poetry dojos.
My voice lifted, the circle held—
In this I get to give what I most need.


©2010 Renée Gregorio