Clare's words
damp dew on leaf reaches my hand
I take moisture from you
leaf, with your eye looking at water from the bridge
finger -touch rain on
each leaf, bramble, rose, bracken, beech
moisture, like source, like that
oh tall fizzled oak I watch your brown leaf fall and come to ground and bring it as one more
deer races silently across our path, intake of breath
messenger guide
soundless joy touched by light
we animal to earth under us and breathe the same air and moment
swift beauty
I saw the deer slide by and be with us a mutual reckoning and acceptance
I lie down where deer crossed to be in the air of its feet sliding though, sharing
a de-lived deer carcass goes by red and headless on a quad bike
life and death of a deer
wildness, a funeral march then after the birth of light
cars go by like strange mourners
now keen, bend with sway as I think of lying in the tear grass, sky tear, tongue tear forehead sea, eyelids wetten
my face is covered in ground tears, my eyes carry my sea out
I lay my hand on soil
a mole’s earth
it is warm as heated skin
I sigh with surprise
I trip on the shape of a horseshoe and feel the horse in my body
birds, imagine your eyes on me as I sway
flower of purple I take you with gratitude to crown what is missing
a double leaf from the long open crossing of the flower meadow empathy embodied in their mutual hold
I lie on the road to get close to a puddle place my fingers in the cool water watch crows high up in the reflection, place the mud on my clothing, hands earthed now, carrying their skin too
one bindweed lifeless and one pure white a n offering of the present moment
I saw a leaf falling caught by another held in a simple rocking
horsetails now I know they are prehistoric and a tiny dinosaur land rises to my left
when I walk like this I see every bird that crosses my path
and my breath flutters with them
are they always there and I not able to see them
thank you seeing warriors accompanying me, you comrades
open all my eyes, sharing this is as simple as a shared instance
or as wide as the world
open cracking crosses borders even the borders we don’t share or understand
Bee's Words
the others are rubbing their waterproof clothing and I hear the flapping of birds wing
I rub my own palms and my skin turns to fabric
