“You allowed me to live the way I wanted to, always.
You allowed me to keep my secrets.”
                -Jean Arasanayagam, from “Portents: For my mother” in The Colour of My Mind, p. 31

Today I’m celebrating secrets.
                This morning, on my way to work, a bird fluttered at the edge of eyesight. Disappearing into a bush. I looked around, trying to see them behind the bobbing branch they’d left behind, but they wanted not to be seen. I realized I wanted not to disturb or disrupt them more than I wanted to see their wings. I could have gone looking, pushing back greenery. I’ve done that before: in looking for birds, in asking my friends questions that they’re turning aside, in demanding (as a classroom teacher) that a student explain why they’re late. I’ve felt like I was supposed to do that, sometimes. And the demanding, asking, looking has felt icky even as I did it. Jean Arasanayagam’s lines help me understand why. It’s wonderful to share, it’s important to ask and support, and it’s also wonderful to have my secret perch in the foliage. To have a family that celebrated that for me, not pushing back the leaves.
                So tonight I’m enjoying the secret stars behind the clouds. The secret movements of small secret feet in the trees. The secrets inside and behind and beneath and running through my conversations and walks with people I love.
                The secrets you want to keep: I’m glad you have them. I don’t want to disturb them. They have their sheltering leaves, their strong branches, their flash of wings.