Roil Sink Rise

A chalice declined.

October gray engulfs me in a disorientating sea. At least tell me how wrong I am or how inconsequential my homage has become. This unfeeling day. This rain that sounds like applause but is only just water on the move.

She said, “ the terrain of paper . . .” That is how a heart hears love. Yet the muse wraps itself in gauze and batting. One insulates and protects. Another struggles to breathe. Thank God for yellow maples imitating the sun!

Which do I want – to drown in the sea or to be left orphaned by its departure?

Roil – sink – rise. You know I am not my words, yet you do not know who I am. Beyond the utterance of pixel and ink is the extremity of love. Married by what we have not done, not said, not believed.

The long, drawn out stories of aspens on the hill. Wind writes the narrative for a few more weeks. Each papery emissary hints at the falling sky to come. I know it's wrong await the running rivulets of April; I'm trying to stay here. From my dining room seat, I side-eye the nuthatch at the window feeder. He warbles a few notes every time he picks through the seed. The chickadee waits his turn on the pine branch and hurriedly flutters in after the nuthatch has gone. These visitors are enough but I do wonder if the cardinal will find his way here.

My beauty lies, but you are not looking for that. Instead you thirst. Drink where you can. This cup of wholeness, of offering cannot be poured out.