So for the rest of the reading tonight, I'm
going to read you some newer work, some of which
was published by Terrain.org.
And this first one is titled "Acedia,"
and that's a word that is very old.
It comes out of the monastery tradition of the medieval times
and even older.
But it's a word that sort of resurfaced during the pandemic
and that refers to spiritual apathy or sloth
or just kind of this sense of not knowing
where to direct your feelings.
So this is "Acedia."
And if you remember too, there was that moment in 2021--
if you're here in Tucson-- where the saguaros blossomed,
and it was this incredible--
way more than anyone expected or as usual.
This is "Acedia."
"At the end of despair, ivory blossoms
broke out not just at the very tops as we expected
but frothing down every saguaro's arms.
The only gold worth dying for filled
those lifted cups for the long tongues of bats
to savor in the darkness.
Through those days we tore at ourselves and each other
but still thought for us, like us
when we saw the long drought over
and the saguaros' joy running over.
Through those nights, the white crowns
shone, light sheeting off every bud.
Insects skimming the air turned buoyant with photons.
Every moment, waves pound us, heat,
and light and the earliest memories of the universe.
We know the rivers sweep through the city but not beyond.
The shape of Sagittarius but not the mystery behind it.
The black hole at the center of all we know.
The saguaros spread a feast before death, flowers swelling
into sugar-seeded flesh.
Ripe and readied, they fly.
They fall to ground packed hard.
The rains come.
While we sleep, they hold the Earth together.
Water shifting hour by hour to match
the stars' cadenced wheeling."