August 24, 2024
Not every beautiful thingmust be converted to use,to poetry, or post,to morality tale, or medicine.Some swaying, sunlit leaves can simply glimmer,Some sunsets are merely to behold,Some plump fruit, fall.
Some Plump Fruit, Fall
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(Missing) The Real El Salvador
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October 2003 I had forgotten my camera that day. I was disappointed I could not capture the beauty of the lake we visited, but, and it was probably a suggestion from someone in the group less brooding and with fewer visions of grandeur, the idea was raised to photograph it in my mind. To use the absence of a camera to force me to notice with greater focus what I was seeing. I thought of the...
Not Yet Born
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April 2, 2022 Basking underneath bare trees,Face kissed by the barest breeze,Gentle sunshine now descending:Winter isn’t never-ending.The leaves have not yet filled the sky,Not yet born, already die.I lay upon the almost greenAnd wait in spring’s sweet in-between. Written at Corhaven, Virginia. What if waiting wasn’t something to escape, but a season in its own right, a thing to...
The Only Shining Thing
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March 5, 2022 The grip of cold is past,But not its gifts:The trees are sticks,The yard, still bare.Tufts of withered grass,Papery leaves, wind scattered,Whitewashed reeds,Seed pods: velvet husks, lone dried bean,Its time to sprout long past.The garden, gone.Beyond the fence, brown brush.Fallen branch.Amidst a mound of dirt Crowned with a sewage lid,A tiny creeping weed,Tendrils outstretched in...
Everything is Given You
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The turning of the seasons, and in particular, the hidden richness in the fallow winter season, have long been of special interest to me. When I lived in Brooklyn, I loved walking through the Botanic Garden in the dead months, hunting for the smallest signs of transformation. A bud months away from blossoms just starting to swell on a branch, a shoot just breaking ground. The space felt rich with...
Exactly Bird Sized
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I hear,from the bench where I sit in the woods,six or seven distinct voices:High-pitched trills,Consonant thrum,Wandering warbles,Insistent monosyllabic bursts. The knock of a woodpecker against the tree opposite me. Each bird speaks its own language,sounds exactly like what it is,no shame in a higher pitchor shorter song. Each bird, exactly that bird’s voice;Each bird, exactly bird-sized...
The Birds of the Air
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January 28, 2022 I’ve got lilies and birds in my own front yard.I didn’t put them there,I don’t keep them there.As they are fed and watered through the natural course of things– a nature put in place deliberately, so Jesus told us, by God’s own self,So I do nothing to deserve their beauty, their symbolism–there is just delight at the cosmic joke,of placing in...
Snow Angel
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I have a gift for you.Here it is, at your disposal:A clear blue sky,Glistening sun, A snowy field,silence.You are invited, if you choose,To lay down. No one is forcing you.You may remain on your feet,Walk those sensible boots back to a warm, dry place.No one will know.Or you may, if you choose,Nestle yourself Into this perfect snow, soft and deep,Prepared to hold you.Your hair will get wet, you...
On Seeing You, We’re Overjoyed
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“They went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and...