Nostalgia is my favorite mindfulness practice.

 

That horseshit of time being such a great

Healer of wounds

When the time travel of nostalgia reveals

Swelling we hope never goes down

Solace of a tingly scar we find hidden in the senses

The passing of time reduced to the first

Moment of silence

Prelude to connection

The intake of breath before the confession,

I don’t want this healed. Ever.

 

When we learn to meditate we are taught

To let thoughts wander into the mind

And then let them wander out

Resisting the urge to latch on to

Any one of them.

No rumination. No reaction.

Let it flow through and away.

The mind rests this way

And returns to balance.

Meditation says let it in and let it out.

Let it be.

 

Mindfulness says hold each other

And fatten. Tip the balance.

Find the dank/murk/funk

Right where you left it and it still tastes the same.

Permission to be completely engaged

Fully immersed, saturated with experience

Feeling flush with all the things

We were supposed to have healed by now.

 

This is the sweetest application of mindfulness

We’re allowed to get lost in it

Get down with it

To sponge it, embody it,

Catch and release and catch again

And only when something deep in the soul

Is regenerated do we let it go

Primed then for some proper meditation

Or improper poetry.

 

Last night I watched a baseball game on television

and thought how much I don’t miss California.

 

This morning I woke to indulge in music therapy

and realized how much I miss California.

 

It makes a freckled body want to call her brother.

And brood upon how good and right is to be

Where we are now, and yet ever

Mindful of how well California seasoned us

To appreciate it.

 

It makes a sullied mind remember how we were tiny

Little gods. We thought words in books said

Different things while the covers are closed

And we made them all line up again

By reading them.

 

Nostalgia is my favorite mindfulness practice.