A Reckoning

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Ovewhelmed by flu

The earth was pulling me in

God was gravity

 

Getting Through

Daybreak, late February

 

A cold rain coming

In a season of decline

Slush in your shoes

Seascape

4WD country, Swan Beach, Outer Banks, NC

           

I loved you,

and you loved him,

and he loved her,

and on and on it goes,

pelagic, ever soon.

And so I leaned upon the wind

and looked for reciprocity

and saw it on the rising swells,

the golden apples of the sun,

the silver apples of the moon.

—last two lines from Yeats

Archaic Morning

After a long night

I heard outside my window

The planets singing

 

Meteors

Arm-in-arm we walked

Flaring on the frozen field

Great for a moment

—after On The Frozen Field by Galway Kinnell

Thousand

A thousand meanings

In the scripture of landscape

The dog leads the way

Winter Hill

On the snow-chalked hill

In the dusk we heard the train

The valley's refrain

 

The Older Poets

(Marzia Bertelli photo)

The older poets

move me the most

nearing the end of their days

in a different kind of weather

closer to the basics of living

the flight of the crow

the warmth of the sun

the touch of the beloved

accepting long silences

the errors and estrangements

each to each to each

accepting the losses

at peace with regret

they have much to teach.

After Clarity

Depth,

then give me the depth

of the stark winter woods,

and give me the depth of the day,

and then in ourselves,

in the you and the me,

give us the depth of the sea.

When Too Much Is Not Enough

 

Under the lattice

Of greed and short-sighted gain

Gaia will rebel