Make Gibbons Laugh #79

In The Waiting Area

At the dentist’s office recently, there was a wait. I waited. Next to the magazine rack. Next to Reader’s Digest and Golf Digest and Reader’s Digestion and Golf Digestion and Reader’s Indigestion and Golf Indigestion. I took a book from my bag. Started reading. Put it down. Closed my eyes. Took a long

inhale through the nose, turning the shoulders to the left, holding the arm of the chair, exhaling slowly through the mouth, eyes still closed, turning, not humming on the exhale like I often do at home, aware that humming or a longer

exhale than inhale helps wake up the vagus nerve, as do gentle chest pats, singing, long looks from the far corner of the eye until you yawn, the sprawling nerve network that runs—gently stretches—along the neck all the way through

the gut, that gently-yet-quickly escorts us from Fight Or Flight to Rest & Digest, as they say, calming us down, in other words,

More “at one”—or “yoga”—with our not-as-nervous nervous system,

Something resembling a seated somatic center

Before this archaeological dig breaks ground in my molars,

As The Eagles yawped from their Yacht Rock station at 8am,

As I considered re-membering on the actual ground

In the waiting area, briefly,

Considering cat-cow or cobra,

Considering how the most realigning positions, I find,

Are named after animals:

Innately aligned, unhurried, embodied,

At ease in their non-doing,

Mindfully still in their doing,

This combination of cats and cows, in particular,

Has helped me upright,

Lengthening the lowest lumber in the lumbar yard

Til these planks on this same porch rest at a more spacious perch,

Now, remarkably, two and a quarter inches taller than I was when

I used to pound the pavement,

Running quickly to, from, around, through,

Making the same hard, left turn on the same tight oval,

This late bloom not even a time in life when

People get taller,

Having already sprouted from 4’8” to 6’0” during George W. Bush’s second term alone,

As if to say, firmly but gently:

We inhabit our tallest selves when we stop running, chasing—

There’s a rhythm to reclaim / Get tall and walk away,

Bon Iver offers us—

Downshifting to a more natural Winnie The Pooh plod,

Convinced I was Tigger for a decade, now

Moseying through every inch of the Hundred Acre Woods

With awe for the warblers I didn’t see before—

Hope is the thing with feathers,

Dickinson offers us.

De-light is slowing down enough to notice the thing with feathers—

Re-membering stillness from motion,

Re-membering patience in the body,

Exhaling,

Opening my eyes,

Now staring,

Staring:

On the table, in the waiting area,

Next to AARP Quarterly and AARP Daily and AARP Hourly was

None other than,

As the upper peninsulas of my back kept opening to new depths, fresh currents,

Longing to elongate heart-melting pose,

Born out of child’s pose,

The tighter cocoon to heart-melting’s open butterfly,

Not to be confused with Butterfly Pose,

Shavasana’s more fluttery next-door neighbor,

Fluttery but still with a still back,

Re-membering that butterflies only land on still bodies,

Downward dog the one animal stance, though,

That never agrees with the lowest rung of my vertebrae, which,

Like with jumping, or twisting abruptly, or diving at pee-soaked fire hydrants,

Or really any dog activity, I imagine,

Still wakes up the lowest disc, briefly,

Still leaves angry voicemails later in the night,

No matter the time zone

Or Verizon roaming charges,

Re-membering to keep my feet planted on the ground,

Firmly but gently,

Even while shooting hoops, how

I used to wear headphones but no longer do,

Feeling so lifted by music,

Propelled by rhythm, buoyed by sound, brought upward through melody,

That my feet would, yes,

Leave the ground,

Body briefly ascendant,

Which is fine for the involuntary takeoff

And quick airbound trip

Until the hard landing,

So, instead, these silent set-shots stay set and silent,

At least for now,

At least one foot planted,

Grounded while still blooming,

Blooming while still grounded,

Never not in season—

Flowers are there for those who want to see them,

Matisse reminds us.

For wheat is wheat, even if people think it is a grass in the beginning,

Van Gogh reminds us—

Planting seeds and tending to them,

Surrounded by Dawn Redwoods, Green Ash, Tulips, and Honey Locusts here

At the courts Bill Walton built, yes,

That Bill Walton: the groovy Red Oak tree himself,

The human embodiment of tie-dye

Both in its unifying purpose and its uplifting effect,

If Howard Zinn and Julia Child had a kid who became the NBA MVP, who

37 times had surgeries on knees, nose, ankles, feet, who

Planted these hoops long after his body broke down—

The best time to plant trees is 50 years ago, they say,

Flow plus meaning equals performance, Walton said—

These hoops still planted, still growing,

Still providing meaning to neighbors,

Long after Walton and his family moved back to California,

Pointing our selves and feet where we want to go,

Although, with hoops,

Shoulders point us more reliably than feet,

Our shooting stance the middle act of Sun Salutation,

The ball always beginning this upward pendulum ahead of the arms,

As if to say:

Our materials lead us instead of the other way around,

Our guide-hand present but really just a loose trellis:

Nearby scaffolding holding the ball

Without holding it, allowing the stem and petals

To break through the top of the frame—

Reach your arm through the top of the phone booth,

Coaches say when we’re young,

Then reach your hand into the cookie jar on the top shelf,

Mixing metaphors and dated references to jumpstart

This gravity-defying momentum

(Conduct the chorus of birds

In the trees there beyond the basket

To reach for then play then hold their highest note,

I like to think)—

The higher the arc, the more forgiving the bounce,

Which is to say:

The more indirect the path, the more favorable the ending,

A celebration of circuitous routes,

Taking set-shots in silence at the Bill Walton courts, who

869 times saw—re-joy-ned—The Grateful Dead,

One of those times on a couch on the actual stage, chaperoning the 1986 Celtics:

Bob Weir and Robert Parish, Phil Lesh and Bill Walton,

Bill Kreutzmann and Dennis Johnson, Jerry Garcia and Larry Bird, who

Spent the second half of his career in cobra pose,

The most venomous shit-talker doing yoga during timeouts,

The precursor to Tyrese Haliburton:

Poetically taunting Spike Lee and the entire island of Manhattan,

Only after adjusting his back brace—

The closest I get to basketball shit-talking:

When I see a few Winklevii,

Or rather: when I hear them,

Bragging aloud about stock portfolios and lavish Finals Club trips,

At the Bill Walton courts, of all places,

Aloud, aloud, aloud,

Wearing their Harvard Business School Intramural Basketball Champs shirts, yes,

The world’s lamest use of cotton,

Who once asked if wanted to joy-n them in a game of HORSE

Before the rest of their stable arrived, and

I won’t spoil the rest—

I won’t spoil anyone’s rest—

But I’m still waiting for an H,

Still waiting to receive some language, any language,

Some light reading material,

A Reader’s Digestion or Indigestion, maybe,

Still waiting as all their horses and cats and cows came home,

Forgetting earlier shots, re-membering the last few:

Two splashes from the free-throw line extended,

Out at sea from the island landmass of the paint,

Although the non-paint area, the non-inner block, is also painted on the Walton court:

Joyful maximalism, this well-worn red and green

For a redhead who played for the red Blazers, red Clippers, green Celtics,

Then one rainbow from the nail, one from the left elbow:

Each a high arc with a forgiving bounce,

A celebration of circuitous routes

(The left elbow with a nail in the OR: a Bill Walton game of Clue),

Then left corner, feet planted on this waxing, white crescent—

The glow of which here you can feel but can’t actually see—

Planted on the far roots of this widening trunk,

Mingling with the roots of these three other widening trunks:

Splashing two more, as they kept clunking front iron:

Timid shots from such blustery voices,

Laying more bricks than The Freedom Trail,

Letting my last three or seven follow-throughs hang a little longer,

Waving my hand well above this phone booth, smiling,

Jostling the droopy phone lines—

Playfully taunting, some might say,

Grinning and flowing, I would say—

Feet still grounded,

Firmly but gently,

Re-turning to silence,

Re-turning upright,

Shoulders back and down:

The simplest-yet-most-profound yoga stance,

Becoming upright

Like another Red Oak, down the road at Mount Auburn Cemetery,

Stretching itself upward and outward,

Born before the nation’s oldest landscaped cemetery,

“Pre-1831,” its sign reads,

Still stretching itself upward and outward,

Breathing and giving

Oxygen to all,

Breathing,

In this chair,

In this waiting area,

This area for waiting—

Prayer is simply waiting in love,

Says Richard Rohr, Bono’s longtime spiritual teacher, which

In this room, at this moment,

Feels both lofty and grounding,

This prayer-full pause—

This windowless holding pen in this airless office building,

Breathing,

Expanding this exhale, expanding this upper-back stretch,

Grateful for flexibility

Both in the body and in location:

Calves on sidewalk curbs,

Glutes on subways,

Ankle to opposite knee,

Off-hour Green Line figure-fours,

Not commuting hours or when sardined next to drunk Sox fans,

Only where there’s enough space next to me

To open up some space within me,

The piriformis, namely:

Smallest muscle in the tush, central hub for the sciatic nerve,

A pinched piriformis housing heat and stirring sting like the Piri Piri spice

In Piri Piri Chicken, chicken that’s piriforming well,

Re-membering our chicken brains are always a step or a hundred behind

Our body’s innate wisdom,

The body incapable of lying,

Noticing tension in the jaw, noticing silence in this waiting area

Other than the industrial jackhammer mouth-drilling next door

And the “Hotel California” at 8am,

Exhaling,

Staring,

Staring,

Wondering what century those doors to the dentist’s office brought me to,

Wondering what alternate reality I was sitting in,

Sitting through,

As I kept staring,

At a book,

Entitled,

Yes,

Indeed: