Nature before me

Poem

 

To play unencumbered a single day – clean

then home again, wet and dark,

a hot bath drawn before dinner,

His attentive touch: It’s all right …

and I am again restored a child.

 

This unholy desire of mine,

cloaked in green awnings,

yearnings shaded, made cool and dispersed

like rivulets of rain, spooling down the drainpipe.

I fall    to the concrete path outside the cabin door.

 

I am struck: awe-spun nature stands before me.

 

My cheek pressed cool and gray

around me, the air sizzles in the Hill Country

heat.

 

 

I see a fawn, spotted and weak, nose to the ground,

but eyes alight; he spies a squirrel and

we are all frozen – the CHILD, the RODENT and the DEER.

Slowly I extend a limb lightly,

unfurl my fingers,

because the need is so great …

I must touch Him touch you and feel the Earth.