Letters from Earth & Sky
Petals
on the earth
and William Stafford
say it best:
You are not alone.
The dogwoods
stand, jays screech
improv
with the hawks.
Yesterday,
the neighbors’
black Lab
came racing by
for a caress,
and you could hear
your own
shameless
heart.
So wrap yourself in
hope & a mask
and walk¬¬––greet
that family at
the end
of the block.
Silky
petals
drop
like divine notes,
& no one
gets
hurt––be
like that,
soft,
kind.
Read that tiny
ant-memo, crawling
on your glasses
while you write:
You are not alone.
Rimbaud
was wrong: I
is not “someone else.”
I is all of us,
on a stroll to meet
the new, the guileless,
and the oldest
blossoming trees––
long-flowering ones
we yearn to sing
& become.
Plume: Issue #114 February 2021