 I'd like to start today is, I believe, the fourth day of Ramadan. I am fasting, and I'd like to start with a new poem that I wrote on the first day of Ramadan this year. So, it's called Ramadan Day One. I enter the monastery, silence, stillness. Ramadan arrives in spring this year, late spring, from my last year of high school, woken in the pre-dawn dark by dad, who prepared our simple sustenance, toast, fruit, water. Then prayer, its melodic recitation before returning to sleep, only to be awakened for school. I sat with my friends during lunch, they apologized for eating in front of me, but I had entered the zone. Hunger, my companion, food did not tempt. Morning light on my page, fish tank trickle, illusions of a fountain, slight crispness in the air. I breathe the stillness of this first morning. Ramadan comes suddenly, and I rush into its sanctuary, unprepared, and begin my daily journey to the setting sun. Thank you. And this is a Ramadan poem from a few years ago, back when Ramadan was in July. Our calendar is 11 days shorter than the solar calendar, and we don't do double months, and so it keeps rotating backwards through the calendar. Now we're headed towards winter, and so the days are going to be shorter someday. So this is called early Ramadan late July. In the dark of early morning, my father breaks the night silence and whispers at my closed door, sehri. Thinking of my cup of tea, the promise of caffeine to sustain me until sunset, I pull myself from bed. In the few days I spend at my parents' house, my father and I share the meal under the dark sky, while the rest of the house chooses sleep over food. Ramadan is so beautiful, I wish it were all year long. For weeks he has anticipated his hunger with delight. I, with dread, not again, not so soon. But by the end of the month I will hold on to this hunger, willing the dark moon to withhold her silver light. For one more, one more day of hunger, one more day of longing. Dark outside, kitchen light on, I make toast, slice cheese and tomatoes, and my father pours the tea. When, by the minutes of the clock, the tiniest rays seep into the sky, we finish our meal and commit ourselves to this journey of hunger all the way to the setting sun. And let's see, I'm going to do a couple more Ramadan poems. These are also from, this is also from a few years ago. And this is called Ramadan day three, Traveler's Reprieve. So we take a reprieve from fasting if we are traveling during the month of Ramadan. I like to say that God loves travelers. So Ramadan day three, Traveler's Reprieve. Silver crescent rises behind the jagged peak above the silhouetted pine in the twilight sky. The sun will rise early tomorrow and set late. A long day of hunger and thirst, but I take the traveler's reprieve. Yesterday, the first fast is hardest, parched throat, not in the belly, long lapses in memory, the search for words in conversation, how long it takes to pull myself to standing. But there will be no second fast, not yet. I take the traveler's reprieve, like Robert Koolbell when we all shook it to ladies night, Indonesia 1994. Afterwards, he spoke to reporter while sipping tea while his bandmates partied in the bar with my sister's friends. Normally, I take the traveler's reprieve, but here in Indonesia, I like to fast. After one day of fasting, I take the traveler's reprieve and get one week of feasting before returning to the fast. I feast for poetry, I fast for God. It's true, beloved. I take the reprieve for poetry, but not for you, never for you. And this other, this next fasting poem, this next Ramadan poem, takes place in September towards the very end of Ramadan. I think this is now 2011 when, probably not when I wrote this poem, but when this poem occurred. A friend of mine was dying and this poem takes place in her hospital room, so I call it hunger of life. I come to your hospital room and slice peaches for you. You are in the palliative unit. You are dying. From the fluorescent lit hallway, I enter your sunlit room, with picture windows looking out at the turquoise waters of the bay and the Golden Gate Bridge in the distance. I am fasting. To fast is to be alive, to know in my body that the sun will set and the next new moon will appear. To choose the night of hunger in the belly, the dryness in the throat, and to wait is to have faith that I will live until the next meal. You hold your food up to your face, smell it, then taste, coaxing your body to feel the hunger of life. You eat a small slice of peach. The sun sets behind the Golden Gate and I break my fast on dates and water. Feel energy spreading through my cells. And so that poem was from my dear friend Linda Sharif, and so I would like to read another poem that I wrote for her. Let's see if I can find it. Okay, here we go. So this is No More Forever for Linda Sharif. I am tired. My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever. Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce, October 5th, 1877. You are the warrior's cry for justice. You are the whale in the gypsy's deep song. You are the traveler's quest for home in forgotten alleys. You are laughter rushing downriver in whitewater rapids. You are the sun over the Mediterranean and the moon reflected in San Francisco Bay. I want to bring the Pacific Ocean to your backyard in Berkeley so we can watch the horizon shimmer and look down into the tide pools at the hermit crabs and anemones. But I see that your warrior cells are raising the white flag as the conquerors take over your body. So let us sit in the sun and watch the flowers grow. I want so much to tell you about the sparrows who now rule the Alhambra and nest in its arches. Dream, then, beautiful one. Let there be leafy forests, sea salt air, the taste of ripe peaches, and the silky warmth of your dog's fur. And I will tell you about the woman who turned into she-hulk after a blood transfusion and fought the power-mongers of this world. Dream, then, fierce one. And hear the lament of the guitar. Let your warrior cells rise and become air. Let them drift and become water. Let them soften and become earth from which new flowers will grow. And when the last cell lies down, go like a traveler into the light and fight no more forever. So this is a poem I wrote while on a poetry retreat in Tasahara at the Tasahara Zen Center. A poetry retreat led by Naomi Shihab Nye, the amazing poet Naomi Shihab Nye, and amazing Zen master Paul Haller. And I call this Tasahara Night. Moonless night, stars beyond, shadowy trees, deep chants, gentle bell, monks in black robes walk past in silence, soft footfalls on gravel path, another bell, resonance, creek rushing. Black silhouette of striped cat rubs her nose against my elbow. It's been years since I've cuddled with a cat, since the allergies manifested. I was ever the friend of cats. It's too late to know if the Ramadan moon has arrived from this valley, one would have to walk up the mountains and look at the horizon at sunset to witness the new crescent set. Sacred month, overlapping sacred place in a profane country. Why are we so shocked at narcissistic tyranny in the United States and not when it rises in poor countries? Duterte, Modi, Netanyahu, Trump. All elected on a rhetoric of exclusion, all pledging to make some place great again. My friend Ahmed named his daughter Haura, meaning freedom, when the statue of Saddam came crashing down in Baghdad. The best day of my life, he told a reporter. The refugees of 1991 could finally go home. All they wanted was to go home. And so I hoped with them, though I did not believe it possible, liberation delivered at the barrel of an invader's gun. And at the end of the day with no end, no one went home, not even me, who was born within the borders of this nation state and never had to take a test or pledge loyalty to stay. Who can go back to the homeland whenever I want, even though these days it doesn't seem to want me? I've made a home of wandering and loss, of hybrid languages, silence, and the names of the divine. I've raised a child on the false promise of a well-built home. And he too is destined to wander. And tonight, all I have are stars, the creek, and the cat. And that will have to be enough. So, let's see. I'll read something a little playful. It's about identity theft. A few weeks ago, I was a victim of identity theft. Somebody took my credit card information and got a new credit card in their name and charged up a whole bunch of stuff on my account. And it took me a while to figure this out. So here it goes. To the person who stole my identity and committed fraud on my credit card. You are seriously testing my faith in humanity. I'm a poet. I consider it my job to find humanity in everyone. Okay, maybe not the narcissist in chief. But seriously, $20,000 worth of smart and final, bed, bath, and beyond, office max, and Whole Foods? Have you no imagination? Couldn't you have taken an all-inclusive luxury vacation anywhere? Okay, they'd be able to track you, but not if you didn't come back. If you must buy things, how about a high-end camera or a piano? Okay, maybe that's all too conspicuous. How about the time-honored way of storing wealth? Jewelry. I mean, if I stole someone's credit card, which of course I would not do, unless it belonged to a billionaire CEO who pays his worker minimum wage or the chancellor of my college who times my salary and is cutting my classes. But if I did, I would probably use it to help friends getting evicted or laid off or buy essential items for kids in Gaza or kids at the border. And since my classes have been cut, I might even go to the border. I'd pack my dad's 2,000 minivan with fresh veggies, cooking equipment, art supplies, and musical instruments and take them to the border. And right at the border, we'd cook up a banquet and make beautiful paintings and music. We'd make a wall with tears, wishes, and dreams. But thieves like you, you don't steal for others. So if I am an ordinary thief and I'm stealing out of greed, I'd build a deck out my back steps, jack up the concrete and plant a garden with flowers, fruits, and vegetables. I'd invite all my friends to a garden party with sumptuous catering. Or if I'd maxed out on the credit card, I'd do the cooking myself. Two musicians would play only two because I don't have room for more. And we'd all read poetry and play music and dance, and it would be magical and worth the risk of going to jail. I might even invite the billionaire CEO, the college chancellor, and let them see what life and joy are all about as I do something beautiful with my temporary wealth. How am I doing for time? Two? One or two? Okay, all right. So I'll do two. Let's see. Okay, there we go. So this is a letter to my future grandchild. It's after a poem by Kathy Jettnill-Kidner called Dear Matafele Penam, which is a letter to her daughter. She's a Marshallese poet, and it is about climate change. So, dear grandchild, you will not be born for many years, but I want to tell you who you are. You carry stories from five continents in your blood. You have traveled from Afghanistan to India, India to New York, New York to Oklahoma, and Oklahoma to California. You have traveled from the Philippines to San Francisco, and from El Salvador to San Francisco. You were brought from West Africa in shackles to the United States, ending up in Oklahoma. The parts of you met here in California where stories upon stories speak to each other. My precious grandchild, if you are a girl, I will give you my saris that unfold like silk rivers. Saris, my grandmother, folded into her suitcase in Heatherabad and flew to New Jersey where she died right before I married your grandfather in Oakland. My beautiful grandchild, it is 2018. Your father is still a child growing into a man. He has not yet fallen in love, not yet had his heart broken. I can only pray and trust that you will someday be born. I cannot promise you much. It is 2018 and the town of Paradise has burned to the ground, and even in San Francisco we have breathed its particles. Your dad has asthma. He has struggled to breathe. I wonder now where I will take you to experience majesty and awe. Yosemite, with its silver granite cliffs, will its trees burn away? Will its winter snow become yearly rains? Tasahara, where I go to meditate and write poetry by the creek. Last year the fires came to its edges and smoked filled the valley. And our own Chrissy Field, will the tides rise up and swallow it up? Where then will I take you to look for sand crabs? If the snowpack runs dry, what will we drink? Will the bees still be around to pollinate our fruit trees and give us precious honey? I cannot promise you much. My love is my voice and my poem. I speak for the trees. I speak for the air. I ride a bicycle. I can grow vegetables. I can speak to the divine. She is the ultimate healer. I speak for you, my infinite love, your grandmother. And this last one is a new poem. I wrote it after the massacre in New Zealand. And I teach a class called Poetry for the People and I was trying to figure out how to respond to this crisis in my class. I brought poems by Martina Spada, Paul Ceylon, Naomi Shahab Nye, and Maya Angelou into my classroom. And after reading these poems together as a group, I was able to go home and write this poem. So it's called To Touch Your Forehead to the Earth. For the 50 Muslims praying at El Nur Mosque and the Linwood Islamic Center being massacred by white supremacist terrorists. You came to pray to touch your forehead to the earth northwest towards the Kaaba. You came to open yourself to recite the Fatiha and let the Fatiha open you. You came to remember that God is closer than your jugular vein. In Christchurch, Christchurch, you came to pray. In your power suit from the law office, in ripped jeans from college, in checkered pants from this restaurant kitchen, in your shawar suit from your house. You came to pray. You came for hugs and kind voices, speaking Urdu, Arabic, Somali, Wulaf, Indonesian, and a symphony of Englishes. La ilaha illallah, you came to stand to face the one, to bow, to sit, to touch forehead to the earth. You came for the merciful. You came for the compassionate. You came to be humble. You came to be proud. You came to tell someone about your child's college admission. You came because your best friend came. You came because your mother told you to come. You came because the baby was driving you crazy and you wanted to be with adults and watch the baby play with other babies. The baby came because you brought her. You came because you're new in town. You came because you know everyone in town. You came because the boy you like comes here. You came because your ex does not come here. You came because you were tired and have too much time. You came to give thanks for your new job. You came to ask healing from cancer. You came to touch your forehead to the earth. You did not come to become the earth. Tomorrow they come to bathe you in salt tears, cool water, and the words of the Divine. Tomorrow they come to dress you in perfumed white shrouds. Tomorrow they come to place you between the Kaaba and themselves. They come to stand, to face you, to face God for you. Though God is closer.