Entanglement
by Lois Bassen
We’re tied up in knots not of our making.
Every morning, maybe a squirrel has left
empty shell bits broken on our steps.
Same spot, every morning. Where is this taking
me? Is the cosmos a scattered shell whose
meat feeds something too strange for words?
Every point radiates to/from its entangled parts.
Touch here, felt there, no spacetime in between.
In between are words without meaning.
We’re connected like ancient Polynesian
textile maps, knots representing direction,
landings bees could dance step-to. Green,
we’re told the Universe is, a pale Eau de Nil.
Ram Dass Is Ready to Die
by Lois Bassen
“The ego, this incarnation, is life and dying. The soul is infinite.”
I think I remember two past lives;
what might I remember of this one?
Skeptical re memory or dream,
I assure you. But those two remind me
at times that we might be other
than we think. One night, I floated
above a sacred grove, an abandoned
site I knew I’d known; the other
was in sunshine glare above cliff
stairs, my family home, my father
on his ship returning to harbor,
my dress white and wind-blown
like a flag welcoming him.
I wonder if I’ve already lived
the moment in this life I’ll remember
when I am no longer me.
Will it be a whimper or a kiss?
Apparently, we cannot choose our dreams
or the moment we’ll remember.
Just one from each life? A good one
offers too many choices. A bad life
is one you’re glad to forget.