Poems from So Much Depends on the Light

Prairie Promise

If you stand where the two paths cross,

you’ll see bumblebees on bergamot,

blue dragonflies riding tall grasses,

Black-eyed Susans swaying in the wind.

Hold very still to feel heat rise,

cocoon you in summer’s steam,

breathe the scent of Mountain Mint,

taste of honey on your tongue.

If you watch the way a monarch flits

in search of Blazing Stars,

you’ll hear the whisper of its wings,

feel the beat of prairie’s heart.

So Much Depends on the Light

 Yesterday cold crackled in trees

below a sinking grey sky.

I pushed ice-covered snow

heaved boulders of white

from deck to untrodden yard

felt the weight of winter’s hold.

Today the same snow sparkles

between long shadows of trees

with the promise of a geode

whose brown crusty surface

yields to a hammer’s tap

opens to crystals of light.

The Hard Part

In the cloudless sky

a red-tailed hawk circles

so high its wings appear

a thin curve, a parenthesis

to interrupt, complicate

the heart-lifting light.

As the hawk stoops lower

it appears a cross

with a body half-clothed

its wings, dangling robes.

It cries out as if

for water or death.

Then its wings narrow

feathers become fletches.

Claws spear a surprised

gray mouse, still alive

lift it into the parenthetic

of the warm blue sky.

In New Snow

Fields of snow entice us

invite us to try

being angels again.

You rise, looking for children

go into the house, come out

holding hands with them

as, they, too, drop

spread wings and fly.