Belated Words

Write On!

Tag: nature

  • haiku: walking Fuzz

    img_20161116_151229788

     dead leaves rasp the street

    smashed turtle at our feet—blood

    caution—slow approach

     

    respectful soft sniff 

    looking up to me—confused?

    unable to speak

  • Earth: In the Beginning

    Mountain_Laurel_b_06012008

    Happy Earth Day! Keep the faith.

    In the beginning…
    not really the beginning,
    but a beginning almost comprehensible,
    a malleable mass twirling on the blowers pipe,
    Earth was cast from Heaven, thrown down
    spinning from the warmth of all she knew
    to cold and darkness thick with the roar
    of her passing and smells of her burning.

    She flew from birth light
    growing dimmer
    and colder to a sadness unfathomable.
    Could she weep for herself? Surely.
    Of all the lights distant but bright
    In their congruity, none tuned to watch
    Or cast a glance toward her hurling fate.
    Did she moan as she was flung

    To her perceived oblivion? Surely.
    Yes, we could have heard her cries
    And her gaseous guts rumbling,
    Crying for a savior for herself
    And for all that could be…crying
    For a hot, brilliant hand to capture her
    And roll her around in his golden palm.

  • The Body

    The body fails the mind even before

    the last moment cast consciousness to where

    it goes.  Forget disease, the slippery tub;

    muscle slackens or turns to stone, wrought hard

    by pain from errant bone, the ear, the eye

    can fail from use , the joints refuse, the lungs

    rebel; the parts unite to fight for warmth,

    for softer, for a peace, stasis, for time.

    The will can be hard hit by pain and dreams

    of youth deferred until can fade or slink

    away hardly noticed or lamented.

    But yet, a mountain bald, a topless sky

    invites just me to come and see a bit

    of truth, hidden, held close along a ledge

    secured by pine. A sweaty climb along

    the bluff, a grunt of pain a pill can not

    relieve, and now I strain to see tiny

    iris, cristata; blooming blue and gold

    and white so pure that God is real,

    at least, worth consideration.

    Atop the bald, a boulder makes a bed

    of soothing heat to draw fatigue away,

    and leave a space in which a breeze warm with

    the smell of pine needles can ease my hurt.

    Dwarf-crested iris, cristrata
    (stock photo)

    This poem comes from 2002 and rings even more true today than ten years ago.  This is not about remorse, self-pity or even ageing, but rather the soothing power and joy that the natural world can provide, at least temporarily, if a person is so incline to make an effort to see the wonders that exist.