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

so extraordinary and simple,

tea with leaves from India,

honey from the devotion of bees

and a small silver spoon stirring,

speaking subtly

as the morning does

of your voice

and the bright 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 up in the gray sky

tall firs sway in a wind

not felt beside the pond

glistening in the day’s last light

abandoned by geese and ducks

even in this mild winter.

I plod along the empty path

watching branches far above

catch and wave in Oregon color

as I wave to the lives I’ve lived

gone like the geese of winter,

wondering what will come on this wind,

if I will rise like evergreen sap

for another spring, another pulse of life,

searching through my inner darkness

for the knowledge of a seed

and a spark of love to see it through.