Many will argue
Or just stay home
But there seems to me
No finer day
For a stroll on the shore
Than one marked
By a chill spring wind
Under a deep grey sky
Spitting rain and mist
In the temperate rainforest
That created the magnificent
Oregon coast
Sometimes
I feel a presence
Out of the corner of my eye
Some one
Some thing
Looking out for me and mine
I turn to look
But it’s never there
But there enough to know
The universe is benevolent
Even if not all its children are
Sometimes
Even in the darkest times
All I need
To keep me grounded
Is a centre line
Through open country
This ominous sky
This cataclysm of cloud
Sinister storm
Unleashed on a landscape
Unapologetically lethal
The exquisite beauty
Of furious nature
And I
Defiant
Steadfast in the wind
Rain pelting flesh
Breathe in all that might
Make the power my own
Become the desert
And the storm
Find the darkness
In the light
And the light
In the darkness
Angry sky
Above vacant land
Allows a torrent
That never satisfies
For the land
Is always thirsty
A brittle star breaks
And within a few moments more
The 4 billion year legacy of life
That is my planet
Will be rendered to vapour and dust
As will I
And all I love
And all that loves me
Pity, that
But all I have in these final moments
Is love
Which I endeavour to take with me
Into eternity
We in our little windows
Of shared wonders
Bathed in common light
While some seek the shadows
To discover glories unknown
Then bring them into the light for all
I stand alone
Solitude in shadow
Cast by arcing stone
Find peace in gentle breeze
Wafting warmth from heated earth
Find beauty in nature’s chiseled landscape
Though the earth accepts my footfalls
Offers bedrock for my foundations
The moving sky
Holds my fascination
Source of dreamy possibility
Sky and lake
Rippled with moonlight
Clouds a veil
Drawn over coy constellations
On the shore
She stands
In a susurrus of near silence
But for the lap of wavelets
On salt crusted sand
Intent on the texts
Passed between friends
“I am free” she writes
“Good” comes the reply
A pause, and then, “Be safe!”
“I will” she taps out
Adds “I don’t know how long
I’ll be AWOL”
A long wait before
“Your leave is authorized” and
“Take all the time you need”
“I will” she repeats
She smiles
Throws the phone into the lake
Where concentric ripples
Interrupt the linear
Gradually diminishing
Until they disappear altogether
She stands a good while longer
Content
Relieved
If a little anxious
About what the coming daylight will bring
Then shrugs it off
“Fuck him”
Hours before the dawn
The darkness has already ended
Pix to Words 