Arcs, Circles, Sphere, Here

An arc of ice and frost
Is never lost in
An old steel wheelbarrow
Where arcs embrace.

We can trace the
Length of a second to
186000 miles.
Does light dreamed
Upon things dreamed
Travel as far?

There are arcs imagined:
"I do set my bow
In the cloud...a covenant
Between me and
Earth."

Such is birth and rebirth,
A dream learned here
Lights an ecosphere.

Happy New Year!!

Fog

When we need to
Find our way in
Fog --fixed bearing
And speed are
Mixed in magnetic
Climb along 
Earth-- a function
Of time in equation
Yields destination
And  rebirth.

Homeric Gods

Entered unscripted into our
World,  devoid  of  form  or
Bias --judgement encrypted
In thought, life, wood, water--
In savant, worm, mind and
Mindless alike strike schism
Or closure;  our composure
Bends --to what end?  Soon
Naked, scaled or rockbound
In storm  or  full May moon
We gain devices  in stars  to
Bless or break  what is ours.
As solid dreams  are we  in
Cosmos  moved,  theology 
Can  always  be  improved.
 

Snapshot, Relatives

We do not number among
Immediate kin but true
Relatives seldom do --
A cousin then, or sister and,
Like that solitary mister who
Climbed off his pedestal to
Sit with her,  adopted
Us, and we, her.
She is also related to Lincoln
If he knows what's good for him. 

Pumphouse Poem

A door, veiled in light,
Unlikely refuge
Where reason wakes.
In there, one makes 
Mistakes but, oddly,
Learns from successes
Too --and prefers them.
Dim recesses accept
Things that fit 
And limit how lost
They get --and why
And where --which 
Is  why  I  often 
Find myself in there.

Cognitive Distortion And Tinnitus

We have only this moment
Sparkling in our sudden
Selves, dissolving as a bit
Of frost to lose in autumn sunshine.
Whether mine or yours to use
Or not, it is enough to
See it do that --run under
Our ringing ears, our fears,
Enduring in distorted years
And yet mind drives, eyes see.
Let us, let me, behave wisely.

Meditation Between Past and Future

Life selects
Certain molecules.
Even in this thought
A trail of atoms,
Disrupted, changes
The past.
I hope the forward
Scope of meditation
Is likewise vast.

Enduring Dragon

Your enduring dragon ,
Invisibly yoked, led 
Thunderheads over
Here in the night.
At first light he flicked
His mighty tail and
Snapped his traces,
Kicked away and sailed
On to other places.

Ratio Soliloquy

Paradise is 
A garden walled
In dream, hopes,
Secrets yet to be
Revealed where absence
Only means something
Concealed awaits and
Hell --a truth learned
Too late-- waits too.
To think, feel, love what is
Succinct and ampliative,
Our instincts must be
Creative, not destructive.
Yes, but we live our days in
A world alive --not thin or
Brittle-- within us, in us,
Each a world done in little.
We have only to reach
Out to its onward sphere
And help, help others
Find happiness here.

Musee Mecanique

[musee mecanique]

Behind beveled glass,
And oak veneer,
She is sad sometimes--
An orchestrion
Rattled, buzzing inside:
Something in dark where
Whippens work; something
In dark over pinblock and bridge,
Ridges, racks of
Brass and ash --spruce
Shim slipped from
A soundboard crack,
Levers lost in
Danger and promise.
What dark entails:
A derailed track
Searching after a
Spring fails. I press.
A little felted hammer
Strikes no reply.
Sometimes she is sad
And can't remember why.

Kitchen Porch Repairs

Replacing purlin, post,
Where rot most appears,
One climbs a house's
Heart from here, alone--
With tools and tapes,
Embraced by redwood bones
Where weather chews--
To review foxing soffits
And incursions upon
A porch's purpose
To protect-- protect
Where life goes on.
It holds onto one
Until the job is done.

Something I Wrote Emma and Ygraine

Sometimes I dream

Of departed loved ones,
And like to think,
When the dream is over,
We all return to our
Different mornings
And get on with life.

Travertine

Eyes long gone,
And what they saw,
Caught under crystal--
Ancient light compressed
In stone, deposited
There-- their tongues
Lapping waters
Turned to desert
Long ago between
Brown and yellow are
Black veins in
Travertine that tell
Of lakes, rivers
Come and gone,
Prairies carbonized,
Wanderers tribalized
And much to read
In a pebble.

Despite Drought

Despite drought, clouds
Venture out and nest
Among  mountains, 
Pile over arid plains,
Do their best at summer
Rain but steam away.
They write a promise
On our pavers: another
Day..... another day.

Visitor

Hello you,
Visitor under 
Shadow where
Summer sun has 
Yet to go -- hello.
Among clay pots
Cooled after night,
While pavers still release
A gentle chill, be
At peace and know
Welcome --hello. 

It Is Us

Force transferred, warmed
Into wind, sun,
Into waves, surf,
Is a voice of stars, formed
As ours --a chorus.
By this calculus, if
An echo hears an echo,
It is us, it is us.

Garcia Bend 1949

I could hear the
Heavy bray of
Barges --sound
Delivered to
A child whose
World enlarged
Along a river.
The other side
Is still wild.

One Direction

Releasing wild things
Releases us too.
You drew a
Limniscate: tension,
Turned upon its curves,
Crossed its quiet center,
Reentered to pass
Through me and off,
Exhaled and set free.

Portrait At Prospect Point

At cascade edges, silent
Mist is born in roars.
Silent light pours into
Silver salts in albumin.
Then eyes arrayed on
Ledges see and --in
Lenses trained across
Time-- so  do  we .

Sweep Second Hand

I can plan the
Contents of an
Hour, know its
Seeds, flowers
And tell where
Rain fell on dust
Where dust sailed
Down in wind.
I can see where
Rain ends, but
What an hour or
Instant is, I can't
Tell, and understand
Eternity as well.

F=MxA, Redux

Thought and dandelions
Overgrow their own tops
So it's hard to tell where
Either  stops  -- then
At a living confluence,  
They  join  in  wind,
Take flight and influence
 Likely never ends.

Sunday Garden Tour

Sunday garden tour talking with
Jim --mostly just sitting
With him in dappling light
Where shadows danced 
Down a breezy tree
To table top in front of
Him and me -- entranced.

In Stone It Is Painted

Nothing she decrees is
Carved  in  stone -- it is
Painted--  and  one
Sees she alone  knows
Where everything goes.
This whatness sticks to
Rock and rock stays put
Face up on an earthen
Clock of garden days.

Earth Noise

I have listened to
The strange noises
Recorded in this report
And they are the same
Sound my bathroom makes
Late at night because
There is a moose in it.
It is a very friendly
Moose but still, I'm
Beginning to regret
I ever let it in.

**********************
[Repost from Sept.,2011]

Fire-break [Earning My Keep!]

April and already yellow
Works among green,
Which means we must
Take down trees and
Grind grasses into dust
Along these margins 
Between summer and us
Before summer comes--
Wards against fear,
Fence fires, here, a
Kind of clearing no
One retires from-- threats
The prairie poses and yet
I spare the wild roses.

In Order Of Appearance

Sun pinched off
A plume of
Primordial fire
Light-years long
Roars at a
Planet evolving a bird
That names itself
A single
Musical note.

Let Us Be As Choo-choos Now

The line winds among
Meadows, mountains,
As rhythm moves us
Through day and night,
Between shadows and
Fountains  of  light,
Between trees and boulders.
Let us be as choo-choos
Now, shoveling steam
Over  our  shoulders.
 

My Sixties

Can I leave the past behind?
It returns --never mind--
One learns along the way
That was,  long ago,
And does not go away,
Not tomorrow, today,
Or now, ever -- go?
I'm not clever
Enough to know, but
Hope the past is kind
And careful with our minds.

Groundwork

An arch where vines
Outline illusion,
Beyond which
Stems curl,
Soldered in pearls
Where fog and
Woodruff fuse,
Compose a circuitry
Of choice and fate--
I am always
A pilgrim at this
Garden gate.

Your Straw Hat

Under distant light, soul
And soul commingle into
Single things that cling as
Planets roll and ring
Ahead of night --and there,
If we wait where all 
Creation resonates, 
Remains a silence
That explains what love
Is: it is ours,  as at
The garden door, your straw
Hat fills up with stars.

Cloud Fetch

I see my shadow in
Clouds today.
I just love things --what
Else can I say?

Romance Of Modern Horology

I've had senses
A long time.

Used to them.

Some lights dim.
Others flare by these

Fences, fill the sky.
I know time, my

Name, planet, under its
Flame, explores
Eons by season, as do
I, while light pours

Into reason

Λήθη And a Sensible Hat

River Lethe or Lima,
I chose to remain in
Possession of my brain 
And remembered fire
Rises, sails swell and
Current cannot keep
A vessel locked in hell.

California Rain At Three

Rain outside our porch
Screen, seen on a 
Sunday years into drought.
She points her camera 
Out because of me.
I spoke of Giverny,
Where it is midnight and
We must catch the light.

Early Spring, Norma Recharging

Morning finds her
Parting plastered leaves
Over flowers---

They unfurl like
Elfin flags.

She sets the camera down.
Some unseen powers
Snag its lens around

And dream prismatic
Beams to catch her
Studying the ground.

 

Remembering Them

Far over
Roses
Ghosts
Embrace and
Fill
The sky.

Roofcat 2

Roofcat surveys all 
He has no concept of
Owning --owns nothing
Except water in the 
Creek, the shrieking 
Things he eats and 
Catches sunset where
Last it lays on  the 
Roofspine-- asks for 
Nothing of mine from
His high peak so, though
A friend, seldom speaks.

Only A Few Months

Over the southwest
Field, where new grass
Strives with old and
Yellow light lines
Earth, the blue
Hour lowers.
Air is still cold, but
Soon, birth below
Will lift flowers
And trees must sprout
Their lace of leaves
Across the summer moon.