WASHING MY MOTHER’S BODY I never got to wash my mother’s body when she died. I return to take care of her in memory. That’s how I make peace when thi… - Joy Harjo

I never got to wash my mother's body when she died.
I return to take care of her in memory.
That's how I make peace when things are left undone.

And whom do I call my enemy? An enemy must be worthy of engagement. I turn in the direction of the sun and keep walking. It’s the heart that asks the question, not my furious mind. The heart is the smaller cousin of the sun. It sees and knows everything. It hears the gnashing even as it hears the blessing. The door to the mind should open only from the heart. An enemy who gets in risks the danger of becoming a friend.

We were never perfect.

Yet, the journey we make together is perfect on this earth who was
once a star and made the same mistakes as humans.

We might make them again, she said.

Crucial to finding the way is this: there is no beginning or end.

You must make your own map.

A poem can be like a pocket that can hold anything, almost anything. You can hold different kinds of time. It can hold grief, it can hold history, and it is often — a poem has come to me or through me, and it’s taught me what I needed to know.