I pick my way beneath
the oily wooden dock,
pilings down in sea water,
my feet invisible in the dark,
feeling the old fear.
I raise and lower in gravelly sand,
edging between barnacle covered posts
then out on a rotted step
where I hear a great blowing
and in the wide cove a whale
silver and magnificent,
arching its massive fluke,
calling me out to open sea.

In the dusky blue of early evening
Venus emerges like a lantern in the west
then Jupiter following loyally
like a light bearing knight;
three fat seals lay above the tide line,
one snorting and belching in his sleep,
dreaming of deep water and fish;
a pair of otters swim beneath them
floating in the flood, waiting for dinner
as Sirius fires in the east,
then Orion’s great scabbard
with Betelgeuse then Aldebaran pointing
toward the twinkling sisters of Pleiades;
the seal disturbs a flock of resting geese
who honk off to the nearby bay
as Mars, Ursa Major, Polaris and more
fill the sky with unfathomable patterns;
when daylight completely vanishes
thousands of stars shine
through the dark form of towering firs
crossed by the shadows of bat and owl,
speaking the secret life of Earth
that was and is and without vanity shall be
within the vast envelope of heaven.

I harvest words within the earth

made of owl wing, moon change,

fallen trees and stubborn grass,

old rocks lending their stories,

wet spray of the winter sea,

speaking in voices more eloquent

than my translation, bowing

before her spreading garment

hoping to sing us all home

in the remaining light.

Ideas give way to feeling,
feeling to the essential –
the mystery of a moon lit tide,
the rise and fall of life in trees,
Jupiter’s pass through winter’s sky;
endless beauty and the sharp edge
where we dwell, angels yet not.
Sun streams across the ocean
everything lifts in thanks,
the oldest ceremony is the simplest –
God the feeling of being alive.

My head aches,

the bones in my hand throb,

their stories of punishment

coming out in skeletal code;

an icy fog covers the valley

and as I struggle to rise

from the dream depth into now

the face of an elder

looks back across the room,

etched with years of solitude,

unflinching, no expectation,

pain a part of each wrinkle,

a deeper joy burning from within,

startling me with the awareness

of who I am becoming.

"Grandmother Moon" by Dirk, Blackfoot, Friends of Red Lodge, Dream Time Series