Tweed Lane

I’ve always hated it —

on the ruffled peasant skirts

my mother wore, stained onto

the heavy desks of unimportant men.

In nature it holds the quiet hummings

of life — tree branches

wrapped with it, muddy toads

cloaked in its coolness. But

trapped on a wall or carpet

or coat — its frozen stillness

just looks dead.

I’ve always been Wyoming sagebrush,

beat up canary-colored cars driving alone

with the radio loud. I’ve been the rippling

turquoise water off the coast of Ithaka,

the iconic blue window sills and the monstrous

magenta bougainvillea, so vibrant

and alive it makes you weep.

I’ve always moved around — and despite

the terra cottas of the sunlit Southwest,

the quilt of yellows, greens and reds

of New England in the fall —

I find myself at home in a log cabin,

with walls that are cozy

but not condensed, where the firelight

reflects gentle gold against the timber walls.

The windows frame snow-capped peaks

of blustery-cold white and an arid-blue sky

and I am surrounded not by dust

but warmth, like a bird in her nest of twigs,

safely watching the world she just returned from.