Deadfall's Gavel

A judgement of crows hangs high in leafless oaks. One nation's slack is another nation’s noose. Yet, if you pull up high enough, it is all the same.

It's too soon to wait on little yellow cups lending their soft mouths to the sun. Yet, sunlight's holy crown glows earlier and earlier through what seems barren. This and other signs, if you are in to that sort of thing.

Wind lashes against windows like an angry sea, and deadfall's gavel against the roof declares a sleepless verdict. In the dark I wonder about what is taken from the sea, rather, what I have taken from the sea – shells, fish, the power to empty. Now a deeper dive to more tranquil waters as treatment for what gapes and seeps.

After the storm, dawn climbs the backside of houses, shooting beams of light through woodsmoke. The vapor becomes a projection screen for nearby tree trunks and the occasional sparrow flying through like a magician. We begin again despite any real proof anything needs to begin or end.

We took ourselves captive and then remembered how to be free. Love is beyond this life and yet, it IS this life.

What truly lives, cannot die.

We've built upon the rock.

And yet, and to quote my beloved, “and yet. . . ”

I light a candle to refocus a longing – an infinite fall into the abyss – a watershed of sorrow over what could be.

Such a small flame, teaching me how to dance.

Forgive me.