Moment

Fractured light

swans along the hills,

Leaps and ebbs

like feathered fire.

Knee deep in wooded awe, 

we peer into the lapis haze above.

Divine artist, roaring 

down the corridors of time

burning cold as serpent's scales,

Your hands, your brush, they crackle.

Touch you, and we burn;

Look on you, we stay.

You charm us with your song,

Asking nothing for our passage 

but our love.

Seeing the Signs

Seeing the Signs

Between the stoplight at the intersection leading into town
and the office where I spend my day on Courthouse Hill,
this morning, for some reason unknown to me
except that maybe I'm awake to it, maybe I'm not lost
somewhere as often I am on these familiar roads,
wondering at the end how I came this far,
or maybe it's nothing so profound; maybe it's just that I clearly see,
between the light and the hill, the signs--
Clip 'n Curl, Kingdom Hall, Baby Face, Fueled on Juice,
even one that says it's one mile into town,
as if, on this narrow road, you couldn't see or
there were any other place you'd go.
I can't help but think when I see these signs,
of our need to say, Here I am. Look at me.
See me. Need me. Buy me. Love me. Me.
and then I look in the mirror at my red lips
and know these for my signs. Know the me I want to be.
In the yard just before I left for work,
I saw a single beam of sun break through the trees
and streak across the grass to light a poplar trunk
from the ground up through the central branches
to the parachute of limbs. A single line of light,
a sign as sure as any, an announcement: Here I am.
Know me. Believe me. See me. Me.

Judgment

And then there’s this:
a tall tree trembling in the storm
like I will stand at judgment
uncertain that my roots will hold
before the breath of God.

Prey

I saw a long, lean half wild rangy thing,

Climbing from the creek into the yard.

It slinked its way across the field

On silent feet and stopped, arrested

By the scent of a baby doll left by

The neighbor’s carefree, careless child.

I suppose God must love even cagey things,

Those attracted by the smell of innocence,

Themselves one moment abandoned on the ground,

The next locked in the jaws of something other,

The next, disappearing into dark beneath the trees.

revolution

all of time

hangs in place

Dark skies spin

a holy fire

of nativity.

all of life

bows its head

A lamb turns

on the spit

of divinity.

all the earth

holds its breath

Grace ignites

a flame

of revolution.