Thursday, March 28, 2024

skin to scales

 i believe we transform into birds 

as we age 

watching skin on m y forearm 

once tight dewy youthful ignorance tight 

cells now expand

wider larger deeper 

like the scales on a cranes leg 

scales 

fusing our life past to present 

fusing our lie to a thing with feathers 

muscles shrink to bone 

articulation becomes more mechanical 

as our cells transform to birds 

we seek the sky 

pressed between two seasons

March 

winter to spring 

lion to lamb 

golden to green 

fold your cards upon the table 

listen while the crimson crowned birds fly .... 

Wednesday, March 20, 2024

these days against spring

day so very bright ...

cloudless blue domed sky 

where both things true;

winter's wind pressed against the trembling green waking 

of spring 

birds 

sing 

pressed against a forecast of rain & snow & cold 

birds sing 

cranes dance 

the river flows away from winter 

towards promise 

birds sing 




Tuesday, March 19, 2024

crane season

 the golden pierces ... boldly at first 

then with a delicate arrow to the heart 

rolling spring-waking prairie 

birds 

gather to dance & feed & lounge under a sun 

bright and leaning west 

to rouse the plains to that one solitary white feathered thing 

regal 

the only sign the only signal to flight 

is a lean 

ever so subtle & decided 

to a rising joy ---

black-tipped wings 


Monday, March 11, 2024

these days

these days 

words like comets come 

in meter 

rhyme 

beauty 

lashing fire & fury 

a speed unclocked 

unknown equations of fleeting light 

words come 

       and are gone 

before I can find my hand to write 


Sunday, March 10, 2024

current & contrast









Of wings & water lifted
solace & sublime
replete of fear
just dancing
we taste promise defined 
chill seeps quietly thru weave of weary winter 
tapped to bone 
cured with time
we rise with feathers wakened
to a goldenrod sky 

life on a minimum maintenance road

a pastoral poem 









tethered to earth 
we bind to our life 
often we're fooled 
to pursuits more divine 
arguing with gods
our pain and our fate 
we long to make sense of
the weight of the ache 

here on the dirt road 
life just shines thru 
dust on our lips 
and 
sky overhead a deep azure blue 
here on the dirt road 
love is everything 
youth is a fable 
and 
the wind knows your name 

plum bushes bloom 
in ditches defined 
pink & white blossoms 
(the jam tastes sublime!)
milo & coneflowers 
ditch weed & broom 
sunflowers & aspargus 
in this quarter-mile prairie room 
a thousand head of cattle 
graze on fescue & rye 
cranes swoop off the river 
filling the sky 
horses peer nonchalantly 
from oak avenues 
there's a haunted old church 
with ghosts in its pews 
wild iris unfolds 
in the afternoon light 
clover clusters in hollows 
held bittersweet tight 
a meadowlark's song 
escapes from a nest 
the moon rises up 
to compass the west 
deer come to fields 
thick with willow & elm 
evening drops its blackness 
stars overwhelm 

but here on this dirt road 
love just shines on 
dust on our lips 
as 
pale blue waits for the dawn 
here on the dirt road 
life is everything 
youth is a fable 
and 
the wind knows your name