I’m (not )Crying; You’re(not) Crying

I’m (not )Crying; You’re(not) Crying

A dead leaf on the sidewalk shaped like a broken-winged bird;

on the wind, the scent of skunk on her meanderings, disturbed;

powerlines hum overhead, a steady ohm usually unheard;

the screech owl, my soul/sole companion, chirrs then goes

silent as the rain begins to lightly fall. Drops freckle my face;

my hair curls. I construct this night piece by piece so you can walk

along with me through the calm cathedral and be soothed.

There, there. China, Spain, Italy, and now here: all of the fathers

and mothers, sisters and brothers, the venerable ones, each

and every immortal beloved dying alone right now somewhere,

waving as they bow their heads below the relentless grey waves,

populates the sky with light, stars we cannot see tonight hidden

behind these clouds. But they are up  there. And, we are down

here. And the night tells us: It will be all right. It will(italics) be

all right.

Poem in which I Attempt to Repair that Which is Irreparable

Dear dead leaves poking through last nights snow, alas, I cannot
rake you. Branches, broken, downed by the ice storm, I cannot

reattach you. Fat white cat snoring behind my back, I cannot
teach you new tricks or wake you. (which cat, I ask, which cat

do I refer to? Ghost cat or living cat; nothing, remember, nothing
and no one is replaceable.) Dear brother, walking away from me

 in a dream, I cannot stop you. You will ignore me even after
you transform magically into a deer (misspelled dear just now)

and disappear into woods where I cannot follow. Younger
brother and older, and me, forever in the middle,  we were three

in the forest, now we are two and I am screaming but you cannot
hear me, dear deer and I cannot hear you. Dear stone walls lost

in the wilderness, gapped with missing rocks, dear Robert Frost,
fences don't always make the best of neighbors. Dear wind and rain

and sleet, endured as I walked every winter night, elements beating
at my face or a back, I cannot ask you to make me any stronger.

Optimistic-ish

Optimistic-ish

This is just to say

that I threaded the needles

of the thinning evergreen

with sunflower seeds

on this coldish January day

in order to watch the cardinals,

titmice and chickadees and occasional

junco and sparrow partake of my offering,

my small gift, my wish contained in a single

slim black vessel that the world will survive

this.

My hawk

I saw my hawk on Christmas day. He was perched on a soccer goal ignoring the gang of crows that were harassing him. As I watched the crows dive and pretend to attack him as they cawed raucously in complaint of his very presence, I experienced two epiphanies. One, that hawks are basically cats with feathers who don't give a shit about your or your drama. And, two, that crows are basically loud-mouthed bullies with a lot of bluff and very little action behind their words. The crows flew off, after one rather brave crow perched next to the hawk briefly. You could sense how pissed off the crows were as they departed that the hawk didn't give a flying fuck about them. The hawk continued to bask in the late afternoon unDecembery sun until a dog and its family wandered through, then my hawk, too, flew off.

October 16th

Tonight, after work, I went for a walk. The street was deserted and dark, the air, crisp, the sky, starry, and a huge, less than full yellow moon hid behind the trees as it rose slowly. It was just me and a few crickets singing feebly to keep me company. As I walked the circular driveway in front of the school, two deer stepped out of the woods and began to graze.There is nothing spooky or magical about deer, but the way this pair of does seemed to materialize out of the darkness was eerie and somehow, miraculous. I looked at them as they looked at me as I strode past them. And, I wondered what they saw as they looked at me. I recalled a quote I heard long ago about nature and research, something to the effect of " that which is observed is changed. " And, I wondered, as the deer watched me walk away if I was the observer, or, the observed; was I the changer, or the changed.

Now, I See

I don't know, anymore, how to write a poem but
that is not important; that, when I shout HELLO

to the blue heron standing still in the moment
as I drive past too fast trying like hell to embrace

morning, I believe he actually hears me, that he is,
in fact, there, as he stalks the calm lake for fish I cannot

see or even imagine, solely for me, in the same way
a friend once said as she looked up into the starriest

sky either of us or even Van Gogh had ever seen
spinning high over our heads, the stars are there only

for me, which in the moment seemed to me incredibly
selfish, but was,  instead, (now, I see!) all these years

later, a truth of being so deeply in the moment and in love
with this heartbreakingly beautiful world that no one ever

really stops to see, is everything. It is everything that he
is there for me even if he never hears my GOOD MORNING.

the holiest holiest

the holiest holiest

if I tell you the morning lake boils

with fish rising to the surface like Jesus

this here this now the holiest holiest

while a great blue heron balances on the precipice

unaware of his reflection unaware he is great

unaware of the meaning of life unaware he is

my husband tall and still and exceedingly silent

as he stabs with skill and recovers a meal

this this how can i share this this if you are not

here with me now while two does pose under

a willow waiting for me to lift my phone

and bring into the focus the pocked lake

the ravenous water fowl the calm mothers

witnessing it all dawn as full of everything

and nothing as it ever was and before i can

capture it the heron takes flight the deer flee

over the lawn the lake is calm and i have nothing

to prove i saw it that it ever existed if i tell you

this will you believe this poem?