halloween

the first snow arrived tonight.

curtains of white

falling and falling.

so many leaves still left,

but that is how death

comes sometimes. 

i am so comforted

that all of us 

will be sleeping soon.

.

Fall

Thick, dark air

and the bee’s heavy song. 

The cool front pushing 

the wild greentops back.

Coffins rumble 
in the storm.

And here comes night

so dizzy with the dance.

Children recite

the Failure prayer. 

A row of glass jars 

rattles by the door.

The Elders are bent

and waiting to ascend

in a room where time
is beginning to end. 

.

The Big World

My daughter and I

camped

on the North Shore.

So close to heaven

in a tent.

I think she wants to live

that way forever.

We curled against

the cold in June.

Wearing winter clothes 

in our sleeping bags.

Just a little

further north

with my father

long long ago

it once snowed

on an early 

September morning. 

No roads 

only water

to guide us

through. 

Today I held 

so softly

his tissue paper body

and placed my hand

on the curved vertebrae

of his spine. 

He said

I hope to see you again.

He is waiting 

by himself

on the platform.

Quiet and still.

Waiting for the next train.

.

Spring Prairie Dawn

I am still on the dark side of the earth

but the monks of darkness have begun

shedding their robes underneath the trees.

Canopies of black.

Layers, stages, stories, bodies.

Thunder rumbles all the glass in the house.

A pinch of rain.

The Mourning Dove calls.

Cloud mountains 

move in perfect silence, 

sailing high above the watery blue 

at the edge of morning.

And here it comes,

filled with golden light,

and songs and cool air.

How amazing

that we can grow new eyes

after so much darkness. 

.

winter stars

Drawing 742 by WRH, 2018

These winter stars

hanging above the veiny street - 

are they darker

with the slow bath of death?

My failures of compassion 

burn like a constellation of pins.

Is fire the price of kindness?

Pain the price of health?

The winters are decreasing.

Less complaints about ice.

More love 

of flinty skies.

The hidden face of time

wraps around my bones,

an old coat handed down

and down . . .

I am forced to lie down. 

My daughter runs 

and jumps on my back

over and over again.

With my grunts of riant pain

springs of wild, green laughter

erupt from her body

and cover the leaping world.  

.