Category: Nature/Ecology

so often the sky looks more
maternal than the earth

i am listening to the traffic
of wind through bare trees

snow on the cliffs growing
roots of ice

from the drained lake
a mechanical thumping

I recall a feeder stream
in lurid unrhyming orange

what’s behind the allegheny front
but played-out coal

the late afternoon light
gains a hint of sunset

warm air dancing with cold air
the clouds turn voluptuous

and the distance even bluer
my own mountain included

on the way home
the apparition of an old man

bent nearly double beside the road
dragging a full bin of trash

the next day snow falls
soft and heavy even in the valleys

with winds off the front
molehills become mountains again

trees are striped white
on the weather side

down in the hollow i spot
the first winter wren in weeks

bobbing with excitement
at the end of a snowy limb

in a brown study of a winter
anything bright draws the eye

one snowflake
wandering through the forest

the scarlet crest
of a pileated woodpecker

her knocks inaudible
above the ridgetop wind

working her snag all the while
i sip my afternoon tea

under a table mountain pine
whose sighs are endless

the sun almost comes out
but then it doesn’t

graupel ticking in the leaves
leads me to witch’s butter

a yellow rose turned
to enchanted flesh

feeding on the fungi they say
that feed on the dead

orange ellipses
on black birch

when bees are imaginary
any brightness can bloom

even green rocks held aloft
by upturned roots

or corrugated steel
chthonic with rust

below the ruin of a pine
sky filling the round holes

where limbs once stretched
toward the sun