Fallen Leaves
Sitting on a log as one at a time leaves drift down,
Then many fall at once, yellow leaves falling through a blue sky,
They make a sound as they land, kind of a soft crackling,
I walk down to the river and the leaves are floating on the surface,
Many are falling around me as I walk,
Fallen leaves floating on the river, fallen leaves on the log where I sat,
In a wild woodland leaves fall to earth,
We all fall to earth in time
A Bend In A Snowy Creek
At a bend in a snowy creek,
I stop and ask the question, can we be more?
Up ahead after life’s next bend, after the sign in the road,
beyond my plan to sit by a fire at this trail’s end,
warming my fingers with flames fighting the dampness in the wood,
taking time to sit with the trees catching the sun’s light,
will I answer that question then?
Or will I just sit waiting for the snow to melt,
by a bend in a snowy creek?
This Place Is Not About Me
Snow geese sky
And suddenly sad
Cold beauty
Grandeur
A deep wild
A quiet joy hidden colors me
I am small here
Trying Not To Think
Sunrise, stark silhouettes,
Gray bark, gray stone,
Dark creek water crossing,
Soil and mud, life and death,
Sun lights the land, the grass,
Yet remain frost and dark hills,
This morning’s headline, line in my head,
Slaughter of the innocents.
I stand in a prairie in scenic hills that melt into the sky,
Touching the tops of tall grasses in September,
As they move in a warm wind,
I listen, to learn what lesson is there,
I feel the life in the grass, in me, in all around me,
I feel the beauty, I feel this place is old, much older than me,
I know it will still be here long after I am gone,
It will be here alive when I am dead,
I am connected to it, part of it, part of something so much bigger than myself,
I realize this place is not about me,
It has a life of its own, which I can choose to be part of or to destroy,
It is earth and sky,
And then I hear and understand its lesson…so am I.
High Hills, Low Valleys
Been to all the high hills
Down all the low valleys
Out of a deep wood
Onto soft, rolling paths
Deep through prairie grass
Wide open and free
Where you can see as far as you want to see
Following streams, chasing dreams
On the run, in a rising sun
Or sometimes stumbling in a drifting fog
Looking for a hidden spot
Breathing in life
While I can
The Far Pond and Beyond
Going to the far pond,
and beyond,
as sunlight spills over rugged hills,
running up a favorite prairie valley,
a favorite prairie alley,
breathing in the peace in this place,
as I move through this time and space,
living aware of the life around me,
in the flower blooms and green grass that surround me,
and I hope as long as I am able,
to choose to roam,
not sit at home,
to go out my door and explore,
the life of natural places,
and human graces,
always looking to go to the far pond,
and beyond.
Alone with the stars
And a rising moon
Holding the night in its glow
Hovering over all below
I can only gaze in wonder
Cool air in my tangled hair
Feeling I can almost touch the sky
My feet on the ground, the universe in my eye
I am both ending and beginning
On a tiny globe in space spinning
Yet, life feels large in this quiet, full of mystery
Standing on generation upon generation of history
Thinking who we are is who we were
In A Still Silence
Out of a dark November night,
Carrying a feeling that something is not right,
I run in chills into the cold hills,
Until I stop at a flat rock and sit with cold wet feet,
But now in my heart sings a song warm and sweet,
Embraced by the wild sense in valleys of frosted grass,
in the cry of geese as they pass,
In the bound of a deer, after we came so near,
In the glint on frozen sumac and bush clover,
in the chatter of sparrows over and over
By a pond’s glimmering, I turn off my simmering,
In the bright warm sunning, where I quit my running,
In the breath of a breeze, in it all, is the wild’s sense of ease,
As the old hills hold me, in a still silence.
Wapatanga Wilds 