On Awakening
It spreads like birth-ache
across curved belly of sky
punctures a gash through daybreak
rumbles and travels, disperses in gray.
It rips from the invisible
the place prayers are sent, where rain comes from.
It deepens into and out of itself
settles on the lower tone.
Thunder is an ancient sound
a phrase collecting voice
across a chord of sky.
In still forest dawn
lightning spurts four flashes
I hover on the brink
between the last cape-flash of light
and the spreading depth of sound
that opens, echoes
old, old notes rolling eastward
in patterns across the Cascades.
On ground in gray light
the everyday patter of rain.
I wake to uneven drops
on our yellow sailcloth tent
my eyes survey needles and pods
dropped overnight on the roof.
They're cast at angles
a lettering, a rare design.
The stirring tapers off
then like a coda
rain pours down
as if waking in a waterfall
a unified sound
filling moss-branch air
and mud-soft ground.
Thunder calls trail off
the forest rushes in water
a surrounding wet hum
drenched with breeze
a sudden cooling.
I turn to my love
who dreams through thunder
I pull closer
as my inner ear
way beyond my mind
attempts to translate it
drum to drum, a telling.
In alert strange sleepiness
between soaking ground
and pulsing sky
I pull closer
to the warm skin of life.
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Amid Green Understory
In a fern ravine
damp fronds in lime shades
reach across the dirt path.
The creek spills and bubbles
unseen towards the sound.
Hillsides loom higher
as I wind my steps down the path.
Wet leaves seep into my sandals
angled trees form my sky.
A sudden rush stops me
lifts my head up
and wingspan arcs between treetops.
White speckles on gray
he lands, stares down
his flat face surveys me
amid green understory.
Does he ask my purpose
consider me a threat?
He startles me, seems strong
he�d blend more in snow.
At different degrees is our flight
in forest shade under solstice sun.
Am I intruding?
I�m a visitor, a wanderer here.
Rain rises off leaves and needles around me
sole owl confronts my walk
pulls me toward his fragile strength.
Solstice reminds me
that soon comes equinox light.
I shake myself out of the gray owl�s gaze
vaguely sensing a metaphor.
He calls twice.
I step along
green summer ground
overgrown, soft with desire
to emerge.
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A Comet's Tale
They say it's ice and dust
I say the arc in northwest sky
contains dreams
and patterns once laid on earth
of pebbles by child's hands
along raked entranceways in backyard woods.
Like a sail it curves over the sound
a broad reaching genoa
tacked to a star anchored on sky's bow.
It cruises at high wisp speed
at vision's trance
through oscillations and lifts
amid all dipped and belted stars
and a half waxing moon.
A deer bounds over frozen puddles at cornfield basin
the southern planet sings a red song
as constellations twirl and unfurl
in sailor's measures of thread and pearl.
Whirlwind sky ignites
with its rising octave
evening breeze loosens branches of winter pines
and the tail ricochets a pipe
and bellows tune from cliffs across the Atlantic.
Does the redwing fly at night?
Caped within sky's color
and shout of obsidian blood
at the nape of its flight?
The cardinals return in morning
he feeding her seeds at the brink of spring
their nest laden with string dust
and eggs speckled grey.
Pines flicker in new breeze
before that phrase
rising fugal across treble air.
The starpath breathes shape into obscurity.
Particles of blinking eyes
trill and gaze at the closeness of a flash far away
out of darkness keenly still
whirling a steel string sky.
All material © Blair Sweeney Maurer
[email protected]
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