His scent lingers
near his bedroom door,
I sniff the air –
a startled deer –
then feel his absence
in the molted room.
Tag: loss
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Wing-Beat in the Grand Canyon of the Colorado
You have said your good-byes like prayers,
used to the words on your lips;
your child has the shape of your eyes,
but the shade of resemblance dances away.
Remember the river at dawn,
flowing between the canyon walls
as the mallards flew swiftly before you
scouting the unseen curves in the channel,
their wing-beats counting down the miles?
The cliffs above you climb beyond seeing,
the water fast past the boulders,
the rapids seize you, twist you,
pin you against the rocks then let you free.
In the pressure of the current,
there is no turning back.
The ravens struggle across the river against the wind,
the cliffs the color of the bead
of blood that glitters from a wound.
You feel the shape of the canyon in your body,
the ocean abandoning the inland, again and again,
the continents shifting on their hidden tracks,
as you dream of separation.
Gather up what you know,
as the weather turns to rain,
the mallards have disappeared into the light
and, now,
you emerge from the canyon alone.
FEWalls
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Prism
The glittering water pulses with rainbows,tosses off colors, swirling, a flutterance –
no thought of loss or want or farewell,
brilliance for a shilling or a dime or naught
gathering the colors up again to shrug them off,
twirling into the garden.
Come back! See!
The crows screech in the firs,
the raccoons sleep in the fennel
leaving the leaves tamped down,
smelling of licorice.
Silently, the crocuses raise their heads,
clumps of purple, thin leaves arching,
then, too soon, they fade into the soil.
The bird bath stutters in the wind and rain.
The waves lapping and overlapping,
casting off colors with abandon,
casting off the past,
casting off you.
FEWalls
A Long Perspective 