Now
Verses on Awakening
In this moment
we are a vigorous downpour,
the rhythmic patter on tin-roof veranda,
consolatory hum of unrelenting rain,
we are intermittant sensation, a tickle of
chill from pin-prick droplets
finding our flesh, bare feet on brick,
watcher and water, catching and falling,
we are the same. We are a garden trance
dancing in glorious sway, stopping the day,
we are the pulse and play of
a rainy morning and distant rumble,
we are triumphant and humble.
In this moment
we are a distant train,
hooting as it passes, and a nearby river
magnificent in it’s glistening, we are
speaking and we are listening, we are
the author and the story, pain and glory.
Birds singing in trees, we are branches and pleas.
In this moment we are I, and I am
this moment, and in this moment
I am the next moment and the
next moment is delusion and
time is illusion. Words are broken,
we are silence and spoken.
In this moment
we are senses attuned,
we are breath and focus,
we are a cacophony of dreams
and submerged mental constructs
fighting for revelation, we seek
elevation from this ground,
but we are bound and we are grateful.
In this moment we are empty
and we are oblivious,
and in this moment we are
obvious and presence and we are
planned obsolescence.
In this moment
we are a new day, we are blue sky
and the familiar teasing of possibility,
we are here and there, swamp and mountain,
the tranquil trickle of garden fountain,
we are the call and play of birds
and the splay of terra cotta shards,
as a squirrel ran the gauntlet
the length of the yards
atop the fence line running away
from my porch and in this moment
I heard the muted jangle of breaking clay
from a falling pot.
In this moment
we are not the not,
we are the game caught
in the bounding escape
of the squirrel that we are
and the forebearance of our gaze
watching him run, a mischeivous one
who is us, in our headlong rush
for the thing or the place
where pursuit becomes chase,
the seeker the sought,
the bemused grin on my face,
I am he, he is we, and we know this race.
In this moment
we are the scene and the seen, the drama
and the audience, we are the unseen and the plot,
we are resolution and rot, forgetting and forgot,
and in this moment we are paradise,
and we are lost and we are found,
we are rain hitting the ground, we are
the boat on the sea, storm-tossed yet free,
and the sea, too, yes we are the sea,
the waves and the wind,
the fathomless depth inviting us in,
the light at the surface, reflected sky,
we are the drowned learning to fly.
In this moment
we are poetry, and the poem, we are
the voice, the word, both the spoken and the heard,
we are the light on our faces as morning breaks,
we are darkness and the despair of loneliness.
We are home, in this moment, and we
are gone. Flesh and ghost, we are present
and yet missing, we are two lovers kissing,
and we are the kiss, and also this:
the moment after.
We are laughter. We are the longing to hold
the remembrance of love in that moment
in this moment.
In this moment
we are the chill serene falling of darkness
on a mid-November night, we are form fading
into shadow as we cherish what is left
and decipher what is right, we are
the question and the answer and
equally the surrendur and the fight.
We are courage and strength in this moment,
and fear, we are why and what and who and where,
we are condundrum and quest, we are
I and we and the rest. And in this moment
we are every this moment
repeating this jest.
–New Orleans, November 2022
