Step within that ligneous womb;
receive
the Tree’s embrace.
Press spine to sapwood,
cheek to curve of fibrous wall.
Close your eyes.
Breathe.
Within that smooth-edged concavity,
lend your heart,
the rapid patter of that bright muscle’s
beat —
so contrary to arboreal thrum
that has pulsed a
century
too low for human ears to hear,
more deliberate,
more at ease.
Emerge renewed with Sylvan tongue,
beneath a sky unfolding
dream.
–C.Birde, 3/16
Morning light, distilled through frosted glass, and ready for sipping.
Still, She sleeps,
and doubtless dreams
(as do I)
of slips of things
new and green —
curling, budding, tendrilling.
Waxing Moon pressed to Her brow,
sunlight’s memory gathered to Her heart.
Veins, a migration of stirring wings.
Patience,
patience —
The dream remains unbroken.
Disturb Her not.
And when I cry aloud for haste —
please,
please —
remind me of the same.
— C.Birde, 2/16
I stood in quiet, chill-winged night to observe the Full Moon, to measure its pulse — steady — and discern its aura — unruffled. We toil below in never-ceasing motion, commotion, emotion. The benign Moon remains.
Hope and heartache —
that small fluctuating flock
gathered in slender maple’s limbs,
suspended adrift,
strung at the ends of gilt threads.
Once square sheets of paper,
smooth white bellies inscribed
in ink and symbol,
folded, creased, refolded,
each careful line pressed smooth.
Cathartic act —
bright birds hatched,
conjured from one dimension,
each a care transfigured
and set to flutter within that humble tree
in ephemeral offering
to Time and weather’s whim
and dissolution —
And yet, year round,
the tree leans,
abloom in brilliant color.
–C.Birde
Rainwater pooled and collected at her feet, pulsed with an Age of Memory.
He stood just off the path, observing his brethren arrayed along the downward slope of hill. Tall and hale, unbent by time, clad in elbow-patched tweeds. We exchanged wordless greeting, each unwilling to disturb the other’s contemplation. I did not learn his name, but no doubt, we will meet again.
Color of fog and feathers,
of cool appraisal and expressionless gaze;
of shadows and headstones
and earth’s exposed and tumbled bones.
Color of passionless judgment,
of days’ old snow;
a friend of long lost years ago.
Color of shingles and slates,
smoke and chimney swifts;
of the hammered plate of February sky
inverted, enveloping;
of hills obscured by atmosphere.
Color of heart’s silence,
and murmuring peal of bells.
Color of cats and coyotes
and the Moon’s waterless seas;
of oysters and bruises and memory;
of ghosts and half-truths,
Magic and melancholy.
The pencil’s path over paper,
building, constructing;
the smooth skins of beeches
and slender young maples.
Color of age and wisdom,
thin filaments threading honeyed hair.
Winter’s Monochrome,
composed in subtle notes
of Gray.
— C.Birde
Earth exhaled a drift of fog over compressed snow…today, Winter has returned.
Winter’s light –
drunk,
swallowed,
gulped;
Cupped in grateful hands.
Fingers’ curved
in grasping seams
through which
that thinned substance
too soon,
too quickly seeps,
fades,
sets.
Eyes closed,
face upturned and tilted
toward hastening light;
For a moment quenched,
replenished,
soothed —
dream of greener days
restored.
–C.Birde
