Serious Poetry

Just hang a left and pavement turns to mud and keeps them out

All except the most hardy

The most in need of peace

I pass the chained-off track to the pond

and I’m almost home

I’m almost to my first and only all-mine place to be

The timbers soar towards the chilly sky

 

I am remembering

Because I can’t see all that with my eyes from here,

 under these quilts

But I know it well.

I fly, mind up,

soar over the tree tops circling the water,

smell the deep new green of leaves unfurling,

peer into the old brown cattails

scan the depths from dark green to the  yellow of sandbars just under the ripples

 

I have swum, paddled, and circumlocated this body of spring-fed water

Peed in the moss, muddied my boots, thrashed through the underbrush

And will get to know it even better

To know its every edge, curve, inhabitants of the seasons

It’s why I chose my land, my place to build, to sink in.

The closest I could get to the clean water and no car will be needed

Walking to it,

Rolling on bike tires to it

Sliding on skis to it

Slipping, carefully treading ice and slush to it

 

Winter ice doesn’t t bother me

I long to see the feathery tendrils creep and claim the surface

wait until it supports me

Testing its edges as faults crack and black streams wind through it

I gaze and swoosh across with the wind

There was no ice where I was born

Then the giant’s took me to the cold.

 

They busied:

 Prepared for games, and conquering.

Child-me stared

up at the sun…golden

 Then down

 where it turned silver in the ice covered boulders

Wrapped, dripped around…

 

Ice grew out over the edge of the stream

 Crept and smoothed across the grit, sand, and pebbles.

 

After a storm of it slew the woods with wind,

  morning emerged.

Each twig, leaf, bark hide, branch arm,

was stiff,

encased, magnified.

 

How could that be real?

How could it be true?

I placed my mouth on a glazed left-over apple

To test, to see…

 

 lips slipped over the glass case of it

sugar sweetness held away from me,

yet stepping back, I admired the presentation:

redly-round

perfection.

 

Underwater creatures glistened above the snowy ground,

Tentacles twisting,

Jelly blobs hardened,

Cracked, sprinkled, licked, locked,

The layers

Elongated,

Exaggerated

Elegantly immolated. 

 

Cold flames captured

Surprised liquids

Nope.

You’ll not flow

I’m here, and so you will wait

Until I let go.

I say when.

So just relax.

 

Enjoy your extension,

 reprieve from time.

Besides, I made you prettier.

Brown dead thing, now you are alive by my grace

I improved you

Made you art

Little bent stick,

Draped in my gown

You dazzle.

 

Now I live where there is ice

and quietly observe it day by day.

Listen closely to it’s groans and snaps

 settling on big water.

Releasing a bit, on sunny days

Until the night…

 when a starry vacuum sucks up and way any warm-dregs

And patient ice

Grips again.

I wish I could drink coffee every day

 

I try to make it a good thing, a healthier thing.

My special brew is ½ decaf, and yet still so rich,

and I make it sweet, I love it sweet.

But with Stevia, not sugar.

Almond Milk, not half & half.

 

There’s many a morning I when wake strong, and can freely, do the deed:

Boil my kettle

Flip open the tall canister

Smell and spoon into a brown filter.

Pour and release the deep seductive

juices and oils from picked, ground, flow-around

dark roasted beans.

I swirl the spoon to achieve a flat-bottom of damp grinds,

as the tide recedes above, filling the dark cave below.

Lifting and peeking at the level in my heavy cup.

Removing the cone,

 I stir one full circuit before the sip.

That first wafting, lip caressing, trip

over my tongue, up my nose, and down to belly.

Carefully because it’s really hot.

Then prepare for another

Then another

Sip.

 

MMMmmmmmm.

So damn good.

And I usually only have that one cup.

I have a vast array

of teas for the rest of the day and night..

See how hard I try.

 

But of course, eventually, even that careful amount becomes too much for my frail constitution.

 

I’ve been too hard on my body.

I have eroded my headroom for indulgences, for delicious addictions.

I survived the other perfumes,

and icy-hot crystals in my nose and throat.

Of expanding smoke in my lungs, and burps of earthy things you aren’t really supposed to eat.

And purged only to consume more in the next instant

 

Years and years of this.

So now my little cup of Jo is too much.

 

I will start to feel a warning in my throat foretelling the end of this run…  get a mild cold after a few weeks or, if I’m lucky, after a month of special mornings.

 

I’m always bummed though.

Always hope this time it won’t happen

But inevitably, it’s back to the tea drawer for mornings too.

Until the throat clears, and the health meter has clawed back up to an acceptable range.

Maybe not even waiting until I’m at full-power again

Because it’s just too unfair!

The injustice of morning tea sometimes overwhelms common sense.

 

This morning, will be like that.

I’m at 90%, and its good enough.

The leaves are scarlet and orange outside my window, and there’s a crap-load of wood to stack.

 I’ll build an outdoor fire in my pit.

I will happily work my land, but I’m not doing it without

My

Coffee.

 

Walking, walking, the wind is blowing against my glasses

around the sides, across my eyeballs and eyelashes

Thin tears well up and slide down across my cheek,

I wasn’t aware I was sad today, nevertheless, I leak.

Walk along, walk some more, looking up and all around,

no moaning, hiccups or whines… nature’s the only sound

 

Wipe the wetness, wipe some more,

this happens quite a lot,

something inside me seeps out whether or not

I am aware

consciously of what’s there

It’s Ok

I’ve come to understand that my eyes do what they need to do

off-gassing some grief while I walk and walk through

the leaves, the sticks, and dew.