dream

I dreamed of you last night.
We were alone and
happy just to be together.
It felt to me like we had
just found one another,
having been parted and
lost in a great thronging
mass of distant strangers that
stretched as far as I could see.

We held each other tightly, like
two people hungry for affection—
starving of loneliness and
frantically afraid to let go.
We kissed like the first time and
my heart beat so deeply
in my chest I thought it
would burst with
happiness and relief.

When I awoke, I found that
we were holding hands—
our noses almost touching.
Your hair curled perfectly
around your ear and your
eyes were closed so gently and
I was desperately relieved
that you had not been lost,
that you were safe with me.

My heart still pounded as
I tried to capture the moment
because I knew that,
soon, we would get up…
make coffee…get dressed.
I would drive one direction,
you another and we would
again be lost in a great
crowd of strangers,
looking for that moment when
we could be together again.

I realize now that,
if I could change anything,
it would be to have you near me
all the time. Every day. And
if I couldn’t do that, it would be
to make a place where I knew
you could be safe and sound,
happy and content until
I could come back to you.

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snow

laughing, dancing in
weightless freefall,
it drops gently on
the earth with
a soft kiss–
bringing with it
brightness and stillness and
creating tranquil new
landscapes as it
blows and drifts
in the sharp-frozen wind.

once fallen, sitting
heavily in its place,
it droops branches
where still green leaves
and needles poke
their way through dark
holes, revealing
newly hidden places,
strangely warmed
by their icy blanket.

little eyes awaken to
find their world
transformed in purity:
a soft new playground–a
joyful new monochrome
respite, ironically, breaking
the monotony of their
day-to-day, even as
their laughter is mixed
with the distant familiar
hollow scrape of
flat metal finding concrete
as, sore, bent, and cursing,
bigger backs struggle
to find their walkways
and driveways.

in the early evening,
the sky darkens again, preparing
to cover the day’s activity
with a new layer of soft
joy. I look out
and see a nimble fox
at the edge of the treeline,
bright-red against
the blueish white. She
looks my way, undeterred
by the cold, before
disappearing to find her
warm den.

hydracronym

steel-stoppered
strangely-symmetrical
sentry,
slight-statured, long-
sufferingly standing
still through sun,
storm, or supercilious canine
sprinkle;
circumspectly and
specially stationed for
service in spurting, soaking, and
spraying specifically when
circumstance summons

gentle friend (one sentence)

Gentle friend, tirelessly
falling along,
trickling your way
through this dense forest,
watering its trees and
wetting its moss
with your clear coldness;

in the Summer, you
cool these shady places and
patiently smooth the
colored stones you find,
refreshing all whose sore feet
make their way to your
steady flow

until, carrying away the
brightly-decaying
brittle leaves of brisk
Autumn which, dropping
tenderly, find their
way to your banks, you

prepare for the Winter,
when your ceaseless
hopeful movement
meets the sharpness
of the freezing wind and
you become like
transparent stone,

resting peacefully in
anticipation of Spring’s
lively call to wake up and
begin your dripping,
dropping movement
again.

sanctuary

literally “a holy place,”

a place “set apart” for
birds and creatures
grasses and trees,
to grow in safety
as they were intended,
free from human
exploitation and greed,
that they might continue
to glorify their maker
by being what they are,
and, in so doing,
to worship.

more commonly,
a place “set apart” for
conspicuous religious expression,
the singing of songs and
the reading of sacred texts.

in truth, the meanings are
the same, as
“worship”
is nothing more
than the enjoyment of
God’s good world,
our own place within it, and
the acknowledgement
of his good gifts.

for, as those texts tell us,
this universe was created
to be God’s sanctuary,
his cosmic temple,
his holy “place.”
that it does not function as such,
so that pieces of it must
be labeled and protected,
is a failure only of those he entrusted
as “priests,”
tasked with its care.

that there is greed, violence,
corruption, hatred, and evil
is a sacrilege, a
desecration,
of God’s place of worship.

I,
for one,
am looking forward,
eagerly,
to its final restoration.
when, as St. Paul said,
it is finally released from
its bondage to decay,
and
we, too, are raised to walk
in new bodies,
on a restored earth
where those who live,
acknowledge him as king,
honor his temple,
and worship him in spirit and truth.

Until then, we,
with all of the cosmos,
must groan as in the pains of childbirth
clinging to these first fruits
as we await our revelation
as his children–

as we await the restoration
of these bodies in his new
sanctuary.

being alive

 

 

 

 

she lays still
in delicate repose
having once overflowed
with song
and burgeoning vivacity
with the eagerness
of a new mother she
prepared her nest
in anticipation of
its coming inhabitants
though she was
cut short, her body still
speaks to the joy
of being alive

the road

the good earth wears the road,
marred as a blight cut deep into its flesh
and covered with false stone
unnatural, an affront to those
creatures it loves and provides for;
the road produces only hurry
and danger, dry heat and smog

like all things living, the ground
ceaselessly works to to eradicate
that which scratches and vexes it
it breaks it down
roots it up
swallows it under

the skies, in solidarity, send
their rains and sun, ice and heat
in hopes of restoring the grasslands
it has disfigured, and the
mountain sides it has defaced

but the earth-itching wound is
ever repoured, ever patched,
ever built-up by those whose
economy is unsynced with
the notion of place and peace.
it knows only
progress and movement
never stillness or quiet;
it knows only utilization
never association
a market of fracked valleys
and blown mountains
and pillaged places
and people

yet

in the deep forgotten places
where there is no utility left
for greedy exploiters
where what could be looted and sold
is gone
the road cracks, and something
green emerges
the birds sing and the deer prance
and the earth slowly restores itself
over this crumbled road
leaving only a faint mark, a
memory receding whose value
is lesson

and I am happy
that God has made us, also,
to live and to heal and to wear
these scars