Color is her gift to us

lifting from the dream

dark sleep of winter

a bright orange promise

from ancient cities

below the sea

to the unborn waiting

in the midnight blue

of her future.

Sitting in the dark
before first light
I feel you in the air,
the warmth of the fire.
Extraordinary and simple
In tea with leaves from India,
honey from the devotion of bees
and a small silver spoon stirring,
speaking subtly
as the morning does
with the glowing spark
of all that awakens.

Something luminous waxes within
as I watch the moon rise
full again upon the Earth.
Telling its old tale once more,
the mysteries of gain and loss,
of all who loved and failed to love
or find their way
on the path of pale light
glimmering in the winter forest.
Speaking in silence
through all our forgetting
of how She holds us
in the ancient folds of Eden.

Painting “Don’s Moon” by Marco Menato

High in the gray sky
tall firs sway in a wind
not felt beside the pond
abandoned by geese and ducks
even in this mild winter.
I plod along the empty path
watching branches far above
wave in Oregon color
as I wave to the lives I’ve lived
gone like the geese of winter.
I wonder what will come on this wind,
if I will rise like evergreen sap
for another spring, another pulse of life,
searching through the inner darkness
for the knowledge of a seed
and a spark of love to see it through.