A summer’s day.
Blue sky, warm sun.
A meditative walk through woods.
Awareness stilled and sharp.
Moving with Nature
Like one of her own
Soft steps, scout walk.
I soften my eyes
And widen my gaze
Sumac, bluebells
Nod their welcome
Scrub oak.
A golden carpet of Norway pine needles.
Slowly, I move
Through hot and humid air.
And then,
There ahead –
Atop
A five foot stump of a pine –
Crow.
I stop.
My energy dispersed,
Part of the moving landscape
No more no less than Breeze
Mind clear and still
I move with Breeze
Or when Crow looks away
I move like Deer
Alert but relaxed
My vision wide.
When looking at Crow
My heart stays soft,
My eyes stay soft.
Slowly, slowly
The distance
Dissolves.
The sun has moved in the blue
Above green needles.
I stand – an arm’s length near.
Nearer still and
Now my breath ruffles Crow’s feathers.
Yet,
Crow does not move
Save to look here and there
And at me, too.
Crow’s eye
Bluest blue
A circlet of tiny grey feathers around it.
Crow’s feathers
Neck, back, wings
Shiny and black
Thank you Crow
For allowing me so near to you.
Why?
Are you sick?
(Would you not think that, too?)
My energy stays soft, dispersed
My breath and Crow’s so near.
I slowly lift my hand to touch
The neck and back of Crow
Soft and firm
I touch this wild kin of mine
I stroke and lift the feathers.
The blue eye
Takes me in
My hand remains
A moment still
And then it is just Us
A summer’s day
A blue blue sky
Above the needles green
A powder blue eye
A circlet of grey
A coat of shiny black
A wise young bird
From nature’s court
A human form.
Her soul expands, dissolves
So quiet still
Crow
Does let her be so near, so near
Where does she end and Crow begin?
The breeze does flow within and through the two,
Crow and she
Breathe in the breeze
Breathe out the breeze
Their shoulders soft
Their hearts as one
All nature breathes and moves as one
And so, one last exchange
And then I step so slow away
Crow still moves not
I turn and walk four steps, no more
Turn back again
And watch as Crow
Job done
Flies up
Is gone
Through pines
Blue sky, warm sun
A summer’s day
A soul’s refrain.
How could she know the
fortune thus foretold?
The tree of life
be broken….
And death would rend her
heart and fly away
With him….
But so it was.
Yet, only now
As writing this
The hidden ink appears
To give her aching heart
A loving gift of understanding
That all is written
Past, present, future still.
The gift of Crow
A seed of mystery
And balm
That one day
Held
A fractured heart.
And kept it
Still upon this Earth.
’tis only now
I understand
Of destiny foretold.
That twenty years ago
When Crow and I were one
That messenger of Death
Had gently told my soul
That Mystery holds us all
Until the truth be told.
St. Valentine’s Eve 2010
