The pearls of life are
strung like green ornamentals
on the equator
The white-breasted nuthatch
upside down the ancient bole.
If it has no soul, neither do I.
Pencils criss-crossed on the desk,
sticks tangled on the ground.
Oblong lenticels, yellow stars.
We try to worship the divine
in our sexual partners. They **** and sweat diurnally
and fear their deaths. But the abstract
God has also died. He lied to say he was
eternal. Earth must burn, universe grow cold.
Old field species become ornamentals.
Mosquitoes prey on us, and black flies.
The body decays, and this is what you come
to love. And the ants that carry it away.
This morning, the profusion of species
contents me. The temperate zone is warm, late May.
The posture of that bird is good to emulate.
In deepest wood
A home once stood
Roses bloom by chimney fall
An old stone wall
Lines remnant trail
Gives heed to open well
Where lilacs trace
An empty space
And fills the air
With scent to wear
An apple tree
And mulberries
An old home site
In morning light
9Mar14
Still the green tolling hope
Like Bedward's jeremiad
Or Garvey's trope
Is something to tell about
Still it drinks sun's fire
And from this alone
Makes bread and water
A man find
On rare fruit trees
Searching among strange ornamentals
Still deep roots bind the soil
Against erosion
Thank God there is little rain
And still the green
Of pastures and forestland
Binds my heart
To the old native land
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