Moonset

the moon was setting

clipped and red

when i returned

the house was dark

and quiet

it's not a poem

the master said

without an ache

this is a poem

Ozone

clouds come evening

stacked in the west

tower and fall

scattering storms

behind the ridge

rolling off grumbling

thumping and pulsing

sweetening the wind

dream in peace

Deer Eating Pears in the Rain

diagonals of deer pogo off

when i sail 'round the bend

with the rain in my teeth

the pear tree bent

over the road like regret

dusk's yellow gusts

pelting sloped fields

water slipping into the hollow

brimming with mist

riding the bike in halflight

leaning for speed

wind in my mouth

tasting the grit of awareness

In the Woods with the Morning Wind

a fresh wind sets me off on the path to the cabin

through the woods when the dew has just begun to dry

to calm this quaking in my chest

i see in the rush and toss the first signs of autumn

nothing lasts for long nothing lasts

the wind moving in the crowns the circling crowns

the shadows of leaves moving on the great trunks

shifting their weight from foot to foot

the wind the crowns the trunks the leaves

all shifting everything shifting

as far as the eye can see and the heart can feel

everything shifting in the wind that brings rain

and i too am shifting and you are shifting

with all of the spirits that preceded us

all of us shifting in a fresh wind

that sets off a young heart

on a path through the woods

to calm a quaking in her chest

we pray never ends

Saving the Best for the End

 expand by clicking

three thousand days

in the midst of eternity

each one as much

as he dreamed it could be

more than a pause and a sigh

Common

please click to enlarge

how extraordinary

the ordinary beauty

in this syllable of time

Discovery

click to widen

battered fliers in days close as hours

i too know the windblown course

the nectar and thorns in the promise of light

yet i believe it is still possible

the happiness of truth

—with a line by Derek Walcott

The Way and the Life

In late July we seek out

those paths and those companions

where our heads are more in heaven

 than our feet are on the earth

—adapted from Thoreau, July 21, 1851

Inner Sunrise

July 21, 2014, Avon Pier, Outer Banks, NC

three months away from the edge of the sea

and i wish you were there with me

—Photo by Lemmon

Synthesis

ordinary days without

the summer the same everywhere

everything i read goes on too long

every line i write has the wrong approach

ah to have the tone of lightning

the brevity of that short syllable

all synthesis in one heraldic stroke

to tell you i have no doubt

the snap and slam my answer

—with lines by Derek Walcott

Midsummer

midsummer lies down beside me like an old dog

both of us covered in a blanket of cheap gray felt

no not a dog i mean you i mean you and me

no there's nothing wrong with our blanket

i meant the sky i was talking about the sky

no no you're nothing like the old dog you're like summer

you know midsummer when it's the best it'll ever be

that's what you're like like summer early summer

you are early summer

and i am doing the math

and i think i might get a dog

Ninth Morning

I am a woodland creature

content in his own clearing

looking up through trees

to the day beginning

the thing about solitude is

by the ninth morning

i hear in the light and the mist

the music of her voice

i love it here

but man was not meant

to live long alone

help me to be human

On a Western Slope

Please see enlargement by clicking

here on a western slope

a dream suspended

as the sun sinks into cloud

behind the last ridge

separating my doubts

from the flat expanse of the continent

i want to have learned from the past

i want to do no harm

i feel the roll of the earth

i feel the pull of time

i want i want i feel i feel

let sacrifice bring absolution

One Morning

First light, Duck, NC

one morning you're sure

what you love loves you too

the world is ordered and balanced


you could walk this tideline

until moonrise      especially then

The Difference

the birch by the gate

you've passed it a hundred times in a week

then someone tells you they care

and the branch becomes stunningly new

Laurel Hill Mandala

from the perimeter

working inwards

pausing in silence

to find at the center

a brighter peace

double-hearted

Laurel Hill Creek

Two-Lane

if you're on a big screen, click to enlarge 

what exactly do you mean when you say

i'm going in the wrong direction

what if i go too far down the two-lane macadam

to run my hand through your inflorescence

one more time what then

still i go on crossing the double line in style

high on your chicory and lace

unhitched to anything

forgiving everything

asking the same

–with a line and two phrases by Lucie Brock-Broido

Luna

we too are in the world

for a short time

flying among the walnut trees

after midnight

take nothing for granted

Space Travel

of ends and beginnings i am unsure

for circles have neither and are magic

the great hoops of the universe

that run through my chest

run also through yours

in this floating world

we sail the same course

without destination

unfocus your eyes

tell me what you see

i follow your song

Symmetry

click to enlarge

all things earthly

lean toward balance

we are earthly

quiet and kind

at our best

searching for symmetry

and lo

there you are

Alchemy

silver vapor of the moon

golden vapor of the sun

so does summer run afield

in the company of loving friends

this life becomes a gilded age

Reflexive

hint of a spider all that it takes

for commotion

glint of a lover all that it takes

for a notion

Still Standing

the daisies' reign has ended

they wither in the dusk

no less pleasing to my eye

lovely in nature's candlelight

having lived through storms

battered and still standing

no less passion stirred

can it be what is left

at the end is desire

Just Blue

just blue it was never about thinking

just something we knew from before our beginnings

just quickly and doomed and we grabbed it and ran

it was me it was you was it me was it you

it was something we knew it was doomed it was blue

Vigil

they spread a blanket in the field

and did no harm

they kept their distance

talking between long silences until dark

and did you get what

you want from this life even so

i did

and what did you want

to call myself beloved to feel myself

beloved on the earth

neither was in a hurry to go home

they watched the sweep of stars

and the creatures that sometimes

flung themselves in front of the moon

— middle stanza the poem "Late Fragment," and with lines by Raymond Carver

Stand Back and Watch

cut off from calendars and clocks

we'd still know it was july

by the scent of milkweed blooms

the hurricane beyond the coast

has cleared the air and even from

the gravel road we smell the globes

of nectar sweetening the sun-drenched day

how tame and bland our garden seems

when in the unmowed field all

we had to do was let it be

Pantheists

clicking makes it bigger

numerous

in the mountains

we believe it

our shadows in the

shadows of ferns

up to our hearts

in the earth

and each other

congregants in the

church of one flower

everything's

connected

click this link to delve deeper

The Eternities of Summer

cooler after a splash of rain

fresh-mown hay shines in the lowering sun

the deep sweet air

holstein swing their tales in shade

doves ask existential questions

a woman in the kitchen cutting bread

her quiet song

be kind my child and leave me there

Fallen Oak

Please click to expand

the great oak grows greater on the ground

becoming ground as we too go to ground

leaning into the afternoon

you see it too as you know i do

we know it together at once

one word is enough there is enough

one yes is enough one smile enough

the great oak in decay time never runs out

but it runs on without us too soon

creating the magnificent now

the proof of what stevens said

death is the mother of beauty

–with a reference to Wallace Stevens

Memento Mori

i don't mind counting

the summers i have left

ten perhaps on average

it's good thoreau said

to remind ourselves each day

that we die

ten more summers

if i'm lucky

and i am i am i am