The cool night air of spring has forgotten what winter wrought when its breath blew over the land. Here, young leaves curl into the day as each morning when light comes from over the shoulder of the east some warmth I do not feel is kindled. The damp earth knows what I do not within root tendril and mineral maze where go all the wormy wanderers coiled creatures, slow slithering beings who, no less than I, live within the shelter of our one home. This I vow not to forget, ever. What is not holy on the land in the dark caverns below or flying in winds above? Nothing at all can I imagine! So let spring warm our northern lives while leaves fall on southern climes. Oh! The rapturous whirl of being! _________________________________________________________ Portland, Oregon - March 30, 2022
Month: March 2022
Late Winter Words
My words, like late winter leaf buds, whiten at the tips, wanting warmth. On frosty mornings, finding none, they wait still under cloud and sun. I have moments when I think I know how words work in slow unfolding or how whitening buds become green leaves. Yet, little do I know of their deep mysteries. There is a secret life of words and leaves awakening out of hidden and hallowed places - earth's cold dark and soggy beds, the soggier beds of my own sacred being. _________________________________________________________________ Portland, Oregon - March 16, 2022
Ashes of Ukraine
Ashes fall over the land tracing on everyone crescents, crosses, and stars. In every family a pieta mothers holding their children in shelters, trains leaving. I touch my finger to the bowl smear myself with ashes from a land faraway. _________________________________________________________________ Portland, Oregon - March 2, 2022 On this Ash Wednesday of the Christian tradition, this is for the peoples of Ukraine in their horror forced on them by a madman.
In Cascadia 