Learning to Sit

My teacher says Be the ocean, not the wave,

so I am a faulty box of Crayola Crayons,

sixty-four shades of blues and greens

azure to aquamarine, the feathers

of a horny peacock’s tail, fresh cut

crabgrass on the planet Neptune. 

My teacher says focus on your breath

and I work the bellows as if blowing out

a blaze instead of coaxing an ember.

In for four, out for four—she paces me

like a trainer, times me with her stopwatch,

tells me there is no I in meditation. There are

two, I think, as the rhythm of my breath

slows and steadies, a tide gently sweeping

out to sea. Seek spaciousness! And I do—

there’s not a boat in sight. I’m like the Minnow

on a three hour cruise, minus Ginger, The Howells,

Gilligan. I become one with my breath, and then two,

three, and four. How many drops of water

in an ocean? Not that it matters, really.

Published in Peninsula Poets, Fall 2021