We’re not wasted
Stars bake their elements
Oysters lick their pearls
~ Lady
Here’s the whole series for the month:
1
Oyster’s silky mouth
Continuous season flows
Opening curtains sate the tongue
2
We beings endure
We build self of shell
With sturdy annual pace
Mountains whet water’s lap
In the depositing of seasons
3
Mountain:
Tectonic kiss
Splits its lip, hatching sky
Gives birth to posture, softens
O’er time.
4
Mountains aren’t common to my experience
They’re mostly wispy ranges in picture frames
I have an inkling, but should I see more,
what I find?
I’ve been to a green one, Coffee Mountain
In Oaxaca when we picked the harvest
Our road tunneled trees like quantum foam
No sign of gross object of which we’re part
What I have from it is photos like flowers
Collected from our path, the pineapple growing
Boinging out the ground, our hour’s hike down
to work Coffee Mountain
Reading is good crutch for real and seeing’s
An abundance of good wealth and luck
5
Inkling,
Like photos through
A pinhole, an eye through glass,
Darkly, and seeing what
Resolves
6
Seagulls bob on waves
Tight wet bodies heft on through
Empirically hewn
Idea rides nature’s means
Nature has primacy with pearl
7
I conjure calmness
Birds quietly light on boughs
Path beckons passage
8
The woods’ anonymous branches
Are retinas spread eagle
Grasping air asking
Who’s there
9
A rose hovers weightless
Some magician pulled his sleeve
Peplums of silk bloom
Thorned fingers knit
The sources of fantastic
10
Like the fairy tales I packed cheese, bread, drink
And jam, buttoned my locally-made shirt and
Knew the source of everything I carried,
A proud container of a universe
I locked the door with my fresh washed face,
Walked down the street where I’d deigned to meet
Every neighbor, pleased with my strong legs
And the proficiency of my backpack
In the woods my mind was resonant with
Candled halos of learning I’d nurtured
Like first spring food for bees is maple
And the nesting habits of the eagle
More than trickles always there to sate
A pleasant burn, the upkeep of good cheer
11
Maybe
Lotus found mind,
Object which contemplates
And maybe bone found lips to fill
A flute
12
Inland girl explores shore
Wild in her cowrie necklace and
Salty sun-boiled skin
13
Little girls in spring
Making plans for the universe
Bright as onion grass
Fat fingers proffer bouquets
Softness caps the season
14
My hand in yours
Whatever’s in me secured
Knowing you tangible
Gyrus-like fingers express
The will of our hearts’ fists
15
Body
Rising from bed
Guided by vagaries Of grace–
Inside, a filament, a
Witness
16
Like a watchmaker tonged and monocled
Wracked and bothered with goals, even fun
I make the clock, my mind’s on clock, I
Screw my face like for a long-distance run
When by grace I’ve got some slack
a sigh untightens something blooming,
pleasant crack aligned for stretch, a retort
to the whip of my constriction
Calculation’s tight cotton needs humus
for its spring, purposed when bearing
accomplished on release
Let my eyes be eyes and let my ears hear
My instruments sharpen, refine and endure
I feast on the din and I compost the blur
17
Chests fluffed,
Tight rhythms grip
For comradery and warmth,
Raw cawed tremulous consensus
To flock
18
Two nests in the tree–
Keen tweezered beaks make a
Statement of friendship,
Placement a consensus,
My circle next to yours
19
Juggling act with
idea I want to remember,
task at hand and time
20
Graceful willows
Buoyant heads bow down to ground
Gentle swish of fingers
Beauty below, above and all around
The hands of red winged blackbirds
21
Eye glints,
Claw thinks under wing
Patchwork land rivered in silver
Threads and scraps he brings
To nest
22
Jeremiah 17:8
“They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.”
A bird’s deliberate nest
held in pearled knots of leaf,
cloth budges with calico shrubs
and shapes, packing the tapestry full
with hearty aggregations
Sudden surprise having heaved
a gasp, cloud floats the aftermath,
spilling story through the land,
wetting wefts of water lapping
rooted Jeremiah trees
Hale honey legged bees trickle filling
recesses of density, being buzzing over itself
like Escher rabbits leaping
dazzled doves
23
Flannel
Static cotton balm
Blooded blanketed calm
The innocence of clay
Asleep
24
Beehive in winter
Mule of a building taking
Weather’s moodiness
Cupboards full of honey
Nurses feed the sleeping brood
25
Time to get you up
I wrap into your smooth, warm skin
Daily dose of peace
26
Some constant tends
night’s dark wool into this
rusted morning
Coffee’s well spins the worsted
from sacred space to sacred space
27
Passerine
casually battened
in the filigree sees me sober
in a lee, wind blowing missives
round its reach
28
We’re wife and husband like warm pillows,
or a crocheted blanket around my shoulders
soft enclosures making love and peace
in the ladles of a womb
Our circumstanced duality a conversation,
like hands on either side of the examined
In a close gestalt I am alone, unceilinged
on my constitutional save for animals,
Spirit and Mother Earth
Umbilical cord unafraid knowing
you’re back home in your chair
29
Planet
water, cloud, land & snow
star reaches into its shadow
rolling asleep, rolling awake
day night day night
long
30
In the story in the sky
Nebula reaches for God or Baby
Dressed in web of starshine
Sparkly contemplation fits
Many vantages of worship
31
We’re not wasted
Stars bake their elements
Oysters lick their pearls