FEEDING THE FAWN

O mountains in my soul

Where I have seen the sun rising

Creating colors that I never knew existed

*

I was not here before

There was no person with this name

Kneeling in awe

*

But now I am

And my skin that is a sheet of neon

And my eyes that are being held in the hands

of a higher power

( holding them like a child holds a newly won marble )

*

O we are everything

And we clasp on to everything

just to know time’s perfume inside and out

*

With the shadows of loneliness

falling upon the flowers

With the crests of gold & silver waves

With the rumor of mortality that I hate to believe

With the thousands & millions & trillions of stars

that I don’t know whether are outside of me

or inside of me

*

With nothing but my body

to take me there

*

I go, I run, I dance

Toward something

*

Having moved through the world

Having felt the world’s betrayal

Having lost the way and found the way

Having caught myself each time I started falling

Shook myself awake

at my own wake

Loved in so many quiet ways

Longed in so many quiet ways

*

Having lifted the veil to discover

that the veil was made of water

*

Having made things with my hands

Having craved things with my mind

Having searched equally for the right sentence

and the right silence

to bring me back into the world

Shielded under the force field of morning

Before there were any lines

for the palmists to read

*

In silence watching the pallbearers

carry my father

In wonder leaning on a birch

to stop myself from floating

In terror aiming for the apple

In wisdom trusting the arrow

letting go of the fletching

to witness that the apple

was the moon

*

In the light

*

In the bootprints of envy

that those gold & silver waves 

have washed away softly

*

I moved through the world

and caught the paper airplanes

that were thrown by hands not of this world

*

I listened with my heart

And with my mortal ears

I surveyed the fields of long blonde grass

that suddenly were glowing

I wanted never to forget it

( Those moments when I've seen it )

*

The road before me gilded

by the fingers of this lightning

Nature’s craftsmanship rendering

me speechless again

Rendering me true

*

Befriended by the fawn

that only appears

when no one is looking

*

And the soft wet warmth

of its breath upon my palm

as it eats

and promptly reenters

the forest of my innocence.