jealousy

 

how i envy the air that gently touches your cheek,
makes your eyes blink in and out
as you make the moments I miss;
I have jealousy
for the water sips that wet your lips,
for the moon glows that crowd your sight
in the gaze at stars and discovery.

Such jealousy, I should be ashamed.
But insist, when i look at your deep water eyes,
and the longing there, i know
i have no blame;

it remembers...

i have known the sweetness of your touch,
 the warmth that climbs from the goodness of your spirit
to glow into my eyes. I have seen the sunrise
in our greeting
and the dull fall of dusk in your leaving.
The sad sound of mourning doves fill
the air that covered us as one.
In the echoes of woman sounds, moments
when we raced the round whirl of night unto day
shoulders and knees, breath unto breath, and
whispers through pressed lips.

I have known, and my skin, it remembers

Jefferson's Shadow

In a conversation about Negroes,
a dream erupts between the solemn thoughts;
given a sight of this day what would they say
that lived with chains and punishment?

I feel the deep recoil as they see themselves
In the modern eye that cannot find the bridge
Where faith guided each step,
and only the hope for those to be
Filled their present emptiness.

I feel the pride of prophesy
When, as if drop by drop, their forgotten prayers came true
Though ripped by dogs and hatred;
Torn by evil that hid in plain view.

A conversation about Negroes cannot withstand
The urge to laugh and cry; the nobility we should have
The inheritance trust, proofed the good of mankind.
When the blood that found fire
‘Neath marks of blue and grey, commingled
for a cause uncertain, a nation gave birth
To a greater self.

A conversation about Negroes distilled a crucial essence
Of a found truth in words meant for everyone else;
that the utterances of freedom and joy-
spoken by self-appointed royalty, caught drops from sky and courageous eyes-
Came to gather and flow into an endless, deep river.
Carrying freedom within breaths of a doubtless vision
On its slow meander into a boundless sea.

Stirred...

 

The pale, flat ocher attracted the morning, moist
with last nights dew, the thickening began
in the cool and dark.
I closed eyes and felt the warmth stored
beneath the pallor, stirred in moon beams
that i could hear slightly as they fell -
filled into the tiny pools- the magnificence of the moon
sparkled like tiny gems.
I pressed down into the mix of dark and light, dry and wet

until I could see

There were more seams and creases
and such that came into the eye
like mountains across the horizon or the fountains
of light that pour from the wall of stars;
i blinked into the next phase of day.

The east began to glow in the treetops
and the deep blue above parted into the layers of nascent dawn.
The flat moon stirrers grew deeper and the color within pushed its way
to claim the eye and remains of the night sky.

The resilient roof washed itself
in the beads that swelled to flow earthward;
gravity and the mild wind touched each one.
Now, it was my turn to spin and face the growing cascades of light
and the warming sun began to claim the water.
Heavy and wet near the crown, it thinned all the way down
to drip the edge.

 

Flowing over me and through me, until my squinted view resolved;
this plane of earth was my borrowed province. I watched
as the world took steady hold of the reality of day

 and my dreams of the silent place 

folded, and softly eased away.
 

Random

Passing time, the fabric of life;
in its undulating folds we live and die.
The pleasures and love that come with giving
of self and all that is precious, can fade into
the anguish of falling sands, and the untethered passage
of moments,

Choosing joy and happiness can provide
a stage on which to perform a life of grace;
choosing to accept the challenge of each stranger
is the path of least regret. Choosing Love,
changes the contours of the world, it is the wide vista
that brings the greatest sight,
a man in the comfort of his being
touching and being touched,
finding order in a random world.

The Year Undone

The reaping seems particularly deep, this season
brought new reasons to wish a speedy New Year to begin;
let the lingering furrows that it leaves on our brow
to round  and flatten by the weight of time and sky fallen tears.
Every turn of the page seems to burn a new scar
some loved or adored spirit wisped away
like candles in too harsh wind; it does not stay.
Life is the miracle on swift wings.

Held like a treasure by those who understand
time is the only path, unforgiving and filled
with the moments we could not keep, and yet
somehow, in the recall they flash by again-
an echo of what was, a wished for return
a quickened flash, and a slow burn.

The reaping cuts so dear, staring glass-eyed,
we feel the winter touch bare skin.

winter's green

Cold gray days, and green trees
wear the newly fallen snow;
they make a deeper silence
as they muffle roars to whispers.

Sentinels of a boundless season, they stand
wrapped in today's fresh quilt,
bowing with accustomed grace
under weight of new crowned beauty.

I hear the groan of tangled roots
the grudging rub of cross-leaned trunks
re-assembling the order
 agreed so long ago
with the flat face of the tilted sun
and harsh and testing winds.

Here among winter's green
embraced by the warmth it needs
to freeze but a little
there is peace and vapor breath.

As if all of the animals know
each day we climb the ladder
to greater light and warmth.
Today, we tread upon earth's sweet sleep 
beneath its soft, white blanket.