all the trees here had leaves again.
The young and the ancient, sap moving,
breathing, throwing pollen to the soft wind.
Amazed joy in the limitless sky and
in the blink of a hummingbird’s eyelid.
Tag sky
With a belt made of stars
I suppose I could walk the galaxy.
No hunter of animals, but a seeker,
a watcher of the darkening winter sky.
There! Look to the southeast after sunset.
Do you see me rising up to you?
Day of the Wren
I imagine the birds are wrens perched
on wires like notes on music paper.
Their complex song, here simple and short.
A day to fly like the king
of birds high in the new-blue sky.
Today, December 26, is known as Wren’s Day, Day of the Wren, or Hunt the Wren Day (Irish: Lá an Dreoilín). Celebrated on St. Stephen’s Day, the tradition consists of “hunting” a fake wren, putting it on top of a decorated pole and crowds of mummers or strawboys celebrate the wren (also pronounced as the wran) by dressing up in masks, straw suits and colorful motley clothing and, accompanied by traditional céilí music bands, parade through the towns and villages. These crowds are sometimes called wrenboys.
Losing My Grip
The Earth spins more than a thousand m.p.h.
and I feel that dizzying speed today,
though I fix my gaze upon trees
deeply rooted, the clouds are moving fast.
I clutch the railing, but I’m rising.
If the sun rose this morning,
the gray sky hid it from view,
and my own clouds hid the sky.
No amethyst dome. No ribbons of sunlight.
No bird song. No change in light
to tell time. Night falls hard black.
Tuning the Sky
My thoughts are in an easy chair.
I hold my wine glass to the window
and turn it to tune the sky
to deeper gray, the trees to silhouettes,
concerns into air, the day into night.
Writing the Day 