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I don’t have to dream the warmth

into being today. Today the sun

burns bright, the sky beaming

a perfect blue. Today birdsong

and breeze are as golden and light

as spring. Rippling, soft, Brilliant.

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I sit wrapped in light, cocooned

in sunshine. Next door in the yard,

Mary offers her hands and healing

between stone pots. She has been there

for as long, maybe longer, than I have

sat out here, notebook and pen, book in hand.

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The years fall away and I remember

the tree that stood here, the way we lay

under its shade on a blanket, toes

in the grass, fingers pointing

to clouds, naming their shapes.

Feel how the wind and light touched us.

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Feel how the green shoots, pink blooms

crawdad mounds and lovebugs astonished us.

Feel how you leaned in and listened to stories

read aloud, turned pages to wonder at colorful pictures.

Feel how we lingered outside of time, Mary watching

from her wild garden next door.

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She is the mother figure of humanity

but also of Earth, of nature in this space.

She brought me a memory of young motherhood.

She is a restoring symbol, one of light

and warmth, but there is also

a tinge of sorrow, a loneliness in recalling memories.

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Is there also a sorrow in her prayers, almost

a lament? Or am I mistaking this

for beauty? Because today I feel

a gentleness, a tenderness

that is spring’s beauty. 

It is almost overwhelming.

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Like I need it to be gray, need it to rain,

need to welcome the cold. But then I look up

into that brilliant blue, listen

to the birds chirping, the frogs croaking

feel the soft swaying of wind, watch

the squirrels rushing in the trees.

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Reach for what mends me, what keeps me

from shattering. Let thoughts fall away.

Let the day — this moment —

become a poem in my mind

that can be written later, revised

into some sort of song.

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For sustenance, for self-keeping, for earth-keeping

for light-keeping —for some kind

of prayer. Because beauty like this

(or is this love?)

should be: remembered, felt,

known.

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