Part of me is held by earth,
part follows the wind
with the gray clouds of winter.
I race with high geese,
follow the crevasse of night
until light breaks
and with folded wings
I return to the cold wet land.
Straining for freedom,
desiring the cave,
I am loosed and unloosed
as ghosts tell their stories
and trees speak in silence.
Like hammered gold
I am forged on earth’s anvil,
shaped by storms
that furrow the sea.
I bring you this peace
deep into winter root
and release my bare-branched truth
upon the morning.

Across the miles
and hours of time
we connect on lines
invisibly woven
throughout the earth.
I speak to you
in your sorrow,
to what is broken
and may never repair.
Our bodies are scarred
but wounds do heal.
To make the muscles work,
the nerves continue,
we build a fire of our construction,
release our designs to smoke and ash,
begin anew with an unmarked tablet.
Amidst the pain and grief,
the lost and never to be found,
there is this flame to light the dark,
to dissolve the way we’ve held the world
and guide us into tomorrow.

photograph by Patrick Orleman

The morning calls grey and darkling
while night travels west
seeking the ocean
and another long journey
across the sea.
I rise once more from sleep
and travel to the heart of the world
on a colorless landscape.
Before light I think forgiveness,
of all who began this journey
and the few who yet continue.
What can we do except love
all that life has given us
and cleanse this darkness
of our own misdeeds
while the world yet sleeps
and waits.

The moon rises
before the city wakes,
her bowl turned up
waiting to be filled.
Raccoons roam the streets,
deer browse the river,
the green world silent
beneath sheets of pavement
as I place my prayer
on the altar of darkness
for all who inhabit the night.