The Wind One Night

You ever feel old inside?


Like a blanket of moss, like lichen on rocks, like mountains.

You raise a feeble hand to your feeble heart and wonder,

There is another way, there is another way.

Starry Night, Van Gogh, 1889

Starry Night, Van Gogh, 1889


Heaps of wind batter the house at night,

Threatening its stickly frame,

Down North Saint Vrain,

By Eagle Canyon, near Apple Valley Road.


The pithy limbs of the Cottonwood are tired

Like this house, bend and sometimes break

Weary from her cold.


Maybe, if we paid more attention she

Wouldn’t rattle our bones, wouldn’t

Need to alert us so desperately to something we’ve lost. 


We could sing to her, bring her flowers,

Recite her a poem in the fading light, 

Rage with her, like the moon, paying attention.


No one can be sure, but now I hear

her calling:


“Don’t wish for,

Too many warm days,

In March.”

Something We Forgot

 

The orioles are back now, 

After the tree-foliage has 

Leaved.

 

Their sunset bodies

Beg for black 

At the wing tips,

 

And shelter

Amidst the green.

 

The Lazuli 

Bunting, A blurring-blue

And orange-cream

 

Arrives first, blue 

Always present 

Before the green.

 

In the burning light 

of Fox,—pure leaping—

 

Earth-dark fur

Uneaten—

 

Chewed until still,

Carried for the reason.

Sweetgrass & Fire

She wouldn’t buy a braided bundle 

 built however rightly there;

would prefer to watch it garden grow,

 thinning, when Time would spare. 

 

She wouldn't tie the bottom or

 the top with common cord;

sooner with a shock of grass

 wetted by her lips—“Better

to wrap it with itself

 surely, in place of this.”

 

She wouldn’t let mine help her hold

 one end of the braid as she took;

the side of her foot was suitable, more— 

 the purity of her tone. 

 

She wouldn’t strike a match, for

 smoke to that green braid;

finer still is candle wax—’tis

 “Better to let the bumbling bees’

 yearnings fuel the flames.”

 

She spoke—when singing

 and then, without sound:

“These are the ways I long for Fire—

 This is how sweetgrass is bound."

 
 

Old Man Niwot

Here, in the west, our blood is built of snowmelt. Up here, 

feet of crystalline water lingers on through summer, sags down

into the catchment bases of cliffs, gathers wind-blown dust and orange fungus 

and occasionally animal fur. The sun's slow tumult across the southern sky

tears at the compacted granules, making them weep their bitter memories 

back into the earth. Trollius, globeflower, and Caltha, marsh marigold, 

and even Ranunculus adoneus—the buttercup of Adonis—

can be seen bursting through, proud of Winter’s longing.

 

“The White North is now sleeping 

through miles of dark soil.” I remember, walking 

 along Aspen Creek to the spring—la source— our life. 

“It feeds us. Is us. The water we drink becomes our blood,

 and Old Man Niwot, he blew it here."  Thank him, 

Thank him.

 

Obsidian Caelum

The sea-glimmer of Raven’s feathers

 captures your gaze— waves

bending light keep churning

 across a pinnate cloak.

 

“I will help you, but if you falter,

 your eyes will become food.”

 

                  Odin gave an eye for knowledge

                                without a second thought…

 

A gamble, but irresistible. 

 

                 Faust figured so, too.

                 

                      ❦❦❦

 

In absence of  mediation,

 we settle for a mediator.

Imminence— she’s shifty, 

 one needs a certain something

to contain her.

 

               A vessel of sorts. 

 

Ask a question first—

 Then, listen. 

          

 

The messages she sends

 digest your mind

into cross-wise thinking 

 of gale and tempest-storm;

into splintered

 polyphony of rot.

 

               Putrefacation is illumination. 

                         Why is that so difficult to grok?

 

Because Sun is warmth—

 we ache to merge,

forgetting our flesh burns.

                     

                      ❦❦❦

 

Raven caught fire while stealing 

 a coffer of light—

similar to Psyche, 

 who snatched a box of beauty

from the mistress of the underworld—

 so we (clothed in darkness)

could catch fish and gather food.

 

            A roller who bet his dice

                       on the redemption of human-kindness

 

A little homage now and then wouldn't hurt...

 

           No?

 

Watch your eyes.