Time and Grace.

I cannot stand

the thought of

losing another minute,

of allowing my tired,

well-fed hands

from letting one more

moment

seep through them,

like water

untasted

and lost.

I fill my days

with heavy steps,

just gaining on

age and inadequacy...

I paint pictures

of the lives

I long to lead,

and I stay so busy

with that brush in hand,

that I forget,

sometimes,

the brilliance

that already surrounds me.

I tend toward

writing stories

with a great deal of love,

but so often

do not look up

from the page,

do not breathe in

the perfume of time

or caress such weight

with curious fingers.

I waste away

in a dream,

falling in love

with strangers

and the most

blazing essence

of otherwise

weak and witless souls,

and I only grow

more crippled

by my mouth's

inability to form

the words

that could bring such

dreams

to life.

How do I

do it?

How do I live

in the grace

and light

that I so believe in?

There must be

some way

to weave these two

feet of mine

between the

hearty natural

and that terrifying

divine.

I am only growing

hungrier

for such satisfaction,

and can hardly sit here,

still and silent,

as such delectable time continues

to leak away.

My Great Alder.

Into my own
browning bark,
I have been
scratching away
days that pass,
as I wait
and I seek
for him.
So many rings,
I have grown,
while promising
my seedling
self
that there will,
indeed,
come a day
when I find
him-
not the man
I was made for,
but the man
I was made
to stand alongside,
a man who can grow
in his own light,
and who coaxes me
to grow,
as well,
and so very well.

I hunger for a spirit
who can dig deep into something
wholesome and nourishing,
though the mouths of bored souls
may call it dirty
or pointless
or peasantly;
somebody who I may root myself
next to,
share in the delights
of the groundwater
and the beating
of that mother sun
with...

and whose limbs may,
at times,
cast shade over me,
or grow tangled
with the thoughts of my own,
but who remains,
always, a solid
trunk, reaching up,
slowly,
in parallel
with my own self...

somebody who stands
and invites the rains
with me,
for he knows
how much it can
feed us...

and whose dappled branches
may cover so much
of this mess,
in their perfectly
uncontrolled,
beautiful way,
whose lace-like shadows we may divine,
as they map out
the way
towards a better
life
for those
living below.

I wait,
with a quiet
and patient heart,
for a child
of the soil,
who will watch
with keen eyes,
as I mature
from seed
to sprout
to sapling;

who will use
limbs, thick and trustworthy,
to summon me
through the pains
of growing
up and out,
and who will
never forget,
despite how high
his boughs may reach,
that his footing
is still buried
in the sweet, soft mud.

We may grow
there,
together
though apart,
for hundreds of years,
and our seeds
may litter this earth,
and our kin
may grow,
together
though apart,
all around us,
or as far as the winds may
carry them.

And though we stretch
so far for the
heavens above,
the time will come
when we will be
ready
to timber,
and shake the universe
with our holy falling,
and as one rots,
the other may
find nourishment
in the soulful decay.

I imagine
the flowering of
two minds
so hazed by
the concerns
of this world
and this bright,
impossible bloom
that brings our souls
full circle,
before wilting
back into the silence,
the dirt,
the endless and all.