Category: Poetry

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Swiftly

Suddenly, some balance somewhere
Shifted.
The stilling air of afternoon
has filled with swarms of gnats
And the swifts, gone for so long
Diving now and climbing
swooping in their zigzag flight
Appeared as from a secret niche
Hidden in some silent fold
In time and space
Called by a faint note, unheard
To eat their fill and then return


How quickly the balance scale can tip
And the unexpected be what is.
Soon neither swarming gnats nor swooping birds
Are seen
And the empty air of afternoon
Has changed its light
To suit the movement
Of the clouds
And the rhythm of the stream.

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North Cape Webcam

As I clean up from our dinner

here in a small village in France

Walter tells me

There are eight people 

watching North Cape, Norway’s webcam

at this moment.

And he is one. 

 

I go to see what it’s like 

In the northernmost fishing village in the world

Where the dark nights of September have come

and the streetlights on the edge of the harbor

Make undulating rivers of gold in the water.

 

I am captivated

And It is as quiet as an ancient fishing village would be

After the sun goes down.

There are no lights on in the houses

Everyone in them has gone to sleep.

 

But a big white van pulls out and drives down the road

out of the picture

Its lights for a moment

Reflected in a window.

And then again 

Quiet.

 

I want to see the faces of the

other people 

watching this peace with me.

First seven and

then four more who have joined us.

 

I want to see their eyes, watching calmly

while I feel our heartbeats slowing

and hear our breath going in and out

In bodies that all have lungs

And brains, and hearts to beat.

 

We would not talk,

Even if we could

We would just nod to each other

In kind recognition

Of what it is that drew us here 

And captured us.

 

The love that peace brings

would be carried by the waves of light

Weightless

Like the golden rivers on the water

of a dark harbor.

 

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Summer Evening in a French Garden

How is it we got to talking,
As we sat out the light
Of a summer evening,
About fireflies?
How they danced in the air
Of our childhood
Making little holes of light
All around in our soul
That now dance as we watch them
In the vast darkness of our minds
Together in the growing dusk
Of the garden?

And that they’re different from
The glowworms of France
Whose little fires sit in ditches
And, in such stillness, signal mates.
No children run
and scoop these into jars
to make those lanterns that will shine
and glitter in the darkness
Of the sleep-night by their beds

Or do they,
The children in France?

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The Weight of Rain

Blades of grass

bow under the weight

Of so many drops of rain.

The pores of all plants are open

Drinking those molecules made

In the dust of some long-gone stars 

billions of years ago. 

 

Those blades of grass do what they do

In the presence of sun and of wind

Anticipation of the moment to come

Is built in each vibrating cell

No choice to turn this way or that

No planning of any kind

Except that which was arranged by the atoms

Contained in the seed 

From which their whole being has sprung.

 

Rest now. Unfold all your senses

The sun, the wind and the rain

know no tenses

They listen to no weather report

Plants will live or they’ll die

At the moment the sky 

Gives them water or heat 

That’s just right 

or is suddenly 

 too much to bear.

 

Do not wait 

With each breath

To know what comes next

Breathe the air

Breathe the air

Breathe the air.

 

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At the Top

There are those who are focused on summits of things
The very highest points they can find.
They must somehow get to the top
No matter how hard the grind.

But in my mind (and my heart)
There is only the urge
To glide without weight to the start
Of that place where the surge
Of the light
Fills every last cell
With delight
And joy is as open as the vast June sky
Where, weightless,
The body takes flight.

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Wind

The wind blows hair

Across  my face 

as I walk the country road

And in its trace

There is no self

But that self which I have known

Since wind first 

sent those strands

To dance across 

The the blank screen of my mind

And set some delimiter

Of space and time

In  vastness  undefined.

 

The who that sees

This dance 

Is neither young nor old.

This who has no containment,

No set of aching bones

No heavy worries, 

No sorrows in a storm

No glances set askance

To see some form 

That blocks the light–as solid

As the stones

 

It seems to be the light itself

That witnesses this flight.

This luminescence shining  

From the flowers in the field

Has nothing it must yield

To learned impossibilities

Or sticky sensibilities

 

The who this is 

That fills with soft delight

Is all there is.

I’ve known it since a child.

The other who with edges tight

Has vanished

And will only come to take a seat

When once again demanded

by love and life’s

most irresistible commandments

Before fading 

into night.

 

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Ruminations on a Death in the Pyrannees

There he lay
on his back
No breath,
so still.
The chill that spread
To my touch of fingers
on his neck.

Blue around those lips
Which had spoken to us
With such joy,
such anticipation
Of things to come
A friendship just begun
As we’d climbed
With bubbling sense of jubilation
Through dry oak leaves
Along the trail.

The feel of his cold jaws
between my still warm hands
The small face
With eyes
Closed tight
Gazing nowhere.

The smell of morning breath
On such insensate tongue
Such intimacy
With what had become
A rigid object
containing nothing
But what was like the ground
Where he had dropped
That life he had been living
With such spirit
Such flights of choice
Having gone from this place
Of flesh and bones
Of minerals and stone
Freed from bounds
Of cells and voice.

Pressing the chest above a heart
So still
Again, again
Pounding on the door
Of a room
Emptied of all
Its personal effects.
All family photos, letters
Rugby clothes
Lettered tee-shirts, shorts and pants,
Even rumpled bed.
Nothing there to mark
The warmth of all he’d lived
Just empty chambers echoing
With all he‘d sensed
All he’d become
Since first breath
Filled his lungs.

Hearing voices calling out his name
I called out to all I hold within
To bring back the breath
Of this body that had contained
Such spirit, those words that
Promised more to come.
My own breath now
For moments
Came in gasping gulps
Set with tears
And strain.


No answer came.
Just murmured words
and breathing
Of those whose love
Had intertwined with his
And who will still be hearing
Echoes of his name

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The Woven Cloth of Love

Long form lying

legs stretched

Waking from 

or waking into

Darkness from light 

Or into light from dark

Swinging up ( or is it down) gently

Swinging back.

 

Pulling threads of each place

Into one another

Weaving 

Thoughts and dreams

Catching hold of thread ends 

from where I’ve been 

Into what is seeming now

Until some last part 

of that long story

Becomes part of what 

I know 

And soon 

will carry onward

 

I see my son 

At seven, swimming 

Towards me

In a deep and winding  river 

With a dark-skinned friend.

Swimming well, returning 

from a first day 

At some new children’s camp 

To come back to our summer group

In a house on some small lake.

 

Standing on the forest floor,

Brown leaves beneath my feet

I see now he is trying

to be self-contained 

As he sees me on the shore.

He calls to me “The camp is fine!”

As he clambers up the bank;

While  I  bend

to wrap him in a towel 

brought to keep him warm

his friend climbs out with frowning face

to join us, blurting

“But they’re not nice at all!”

With those words, my son’s brown eyes

begin to shine

Unshed tears becoming

moons of light

As his heart swings wide 

And he tells me of the disappointments

and the wounds

they have suffered

All day long.

 

He shivers and I reach down 

In the gesture of a mother

Lifting up her son

And he puts his arms around my neck

As I pull him to my chest.

He wraps his  thin strong legs around my waist

And I walk with him in warm embrace

His head against my own 

His friend holding the fingers of my hand

As he walks close against my side

And my son gently cries and tries his best

Not to be too harsh

With what has caused such pain.

 

Filled  with love and sorrow 

I walk along 

Until we both dissolve 

In mid complaint

And I am left with

All this love and this regret 

To weave 

As gleaming threads 

Into what we call

The day.

 

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Humility

Back to writing. That’s what there is.

So what am I learning?

Humility.

 

My mind lets so much slip away from it these days, it seems to have lost whatever stickiness it once had. I am barely worthy to be here amidst all this beauty. The humility of being so miserably human, I must watch for the smallest signs of how to move
from the breeze that blows the winter grass.

 

Oh how I wish for what is done 

to be undone

Oh how I yearn for light to come 

before the blooming dawn

The light that shows the beauty that surrounds us

The light that shines through all that binds us.

 

Minds are clouded. Hearts are bound

While all we really need to do

is turn around

And see the face that’s there behind us

Thawing all the ice that binds us.

Loving eyes that melt all blindness 

And watch each step with loving kindness.

 

Its presence is there in every tree

In earth that crumbles down the scree

Its dark, damp fragrance filling me

With such stirring desire to break free

As if I were a sprouting seed

Casting off a leaf of weed

To find the sun from which I feed.

 

We need. We need

But it’s for each other 

That we plead.

It’s for the bleeding 

Face before us

Sorrow, fear 

In every tear.

 

Pull her gently 

To your breast

There oh there

Is where she’ll rest.

 

 

 

 

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New Year’s Wish

As this old year passes

May peace settle gently

in all of our hearts

and may the virus of love

become a pandemic.

 

May we shed our anger

And our fear

as the year breathes out

its last breath.

 

And as the new year comes to greet us

may we find joy in each other

May we play and laugh together

As children

Even as each day

We open any closed door

In that vast space inside us

To feel, at last, the suffering of all

And let our hearts

Truly break.