Undreamed — A Poem

“Undreamed” — C.Birde, 6/20

O, wanderer. Lost in honeysuckled dream vined sweetly ‘round wrists, half truths hard thumbed against eyelids, shadows lodged in thy white throat, & tongue embittered. Complicity of sleep & dreaming. Abrupt awakening to a world never gentler than it is or was or will be. Wings plucked & fallen. Heart bruised. Soul starved. Arrive at last, in full embrace.

Cracked open.

— C.Birde, 6/20

Ghostwood — A Dream

“Ghostwood” — C.Birde, 6/20

Deep,

dark wood,

moon-bleached

and rinsed of light

of color.

Earth lifts —

root-twined,

rocky —

in slow and steady

upward arch

beneath a burden

of pines.

Gaunt figure.

Slack of limb

and wasted frame,

flame of hair and

spirit snuffed.

He shuffles unaware

in shabby slippers

and threadbare robe

between attentive,

watchful trees.

Alone.

Alone and ghostly.

Diminished.

Lost among

the elements,

whose beauty

would be magnified

did he not

haunt them

so.

— C.Birde, 6/20

Merriam Oak — An Image

Created with Nokia Smart Cam
“Merriam Oak” — C.Birde, 11/15

Merriam Oak has let go a sheaf of bronze-bright leaves, each as large as my booted foot, or larger. To walk beneath these bare and spreading boughs is to kick through a three-season journal, each leaf an entry, while the author prepares for rest and reflection during the spare Winter days to come.

 

Autumn Reservoir — An Image

Autumn Reservoir 2“Autumn Reservoir” — C.Birde, 10/16/15

Slowly, the Reservoir refills,

its shoreline diminishing,

as a narrow ribbon of water twists

and dashes around worn-smooth stones

ordinarily submerged.

–C.Birde

Readjustment — A Truth

Created with Nokia Smart Cam
“Climbing Norumbega Mountain” — C.Birde, Sept. 2015

I think I am in withdrawal — no more two-, three-, four-plus-hour hikes through landscape that transforms and surprises with shift of wind and sunlight’s exposure. No more sandwiches and chocolate atop weathered, bald-capped mountains; nor the chitter and scold of red squirrels, otherwise silent as breath. The Canine Electron, I am certain, misses the adventure, as well.

But today — this moment, right here, right now — is lovely. A great depth of Autumn sky sprawls above our small, familiar patch of Earth. Together, we have put some miles beneath our eager feet.

The Tarn Trail (Kane Path) — A Truth

Boulders for stepping stones pressed

against the Tarn’s edge;

Smooth waters dimpled and pocked

with browned lily pads and

rusted grasses rippled

by insistent breeze;

Break upon woodland

of lump-barked ashes,

rough maples and fine-needled pines

lit by fleet, dappled light;

Rock- and root-strewn path

of hard-packed earth

carpeted with fallen leaves

undulating, wave-like;

The air, wildflower scented —

asters, goldenrods, and hawkweed;

Leopard frog amidst the leaf mould;

All sounds of humanity,

except our own,

fallen away.

–C.Birde

The Tarn 9.15