I thought the trail was over
just beyond the yellow gate.
But no.
The daisies drew me in and I soon found
that with a little ducking
and bending around,
I could continue on.

I thought I'd turn around for sure
in that first clearing at the top of the hill--
It seemed like such
a perfect stopping point--
so high!
but something in me still was hungry,
so I crossed the grass and found
a path that led me deeper in.

The conifer-lined walking trail
bade me sigh with aches and joys,
rewarding me
with simple pleasures, now and then--
a bunch of purple flowers
or a little pool of polliwogs.
It's rolling ridges continued on, the end always hidden behind
one more turn.

The forest, very kind to me,
has never truly let me see
anything to satisfy without a whispered mystery.
A promise, or a hope, at least,
a path so many wonders deep
coaxes, smiles, unfolds to me
and keeps me coming ever back.

Someday, when I'm transformed
I'll know
it's twists and turns are infinite
and wonders over and below I haven't half considered yet.
But now, where all seems closing in, I'll ever be surprised
each time it isn't over yet--each time I learn to rise.

"N
     o;"

she said, slowly,
the word dropping from her lips like the gentle uncorking
of a stopped-up bottle.

"No,
Maybe I won't do a great job.

I’ll do a
FINE job,
a
GOOD job,
a
~decent~ job,
an O-KAY JOB, an
ac
cep
table/ job.”

(First, she enunciated. Then, she spat.)

"Maybe--"
--she paused, for breath or consideration
as an overdue gleam
found it's way into her countenance--

"Maybe I'll do a MEDIOCRE
job. An AVERAGE job.
A /much-to-be-desired/ job.
Perhaps
I'll
do
a
SAD job, a SLOW job, a HACKNEYED job, a ~pathetic~ job!

MAYBE..."

...here, she paused again, as one should always do when giving a proclamation...

"...I'll do a BAD job.

And THAT'S O KAY."



Speech complete,
she sat--heaving--with her knees pulled into her chest.
After a good while
and a few kicked clumpfuls of grass,
she rose
and returned to her life,
doing just about as well
what she had done
before.

Have you ever been somewhere
the acoustics just right
and your voice somehow warmed like a fresh cup of tea?
You hear yourself singing
notes tender and bright
and the atmosphere joins in your melody.

Not a scratch or a crack.

It's just like the sunlight of goldenest hours
or the dimly lit mirror that conceals and empowers--
all your flaws swept away a merciful haze,

backlit and glowing.

Have you ever loved someone
like a radiant ghost
or a bright constellation of beautiful things?
Head so high past the clouds
in the glittery host,
you could make out the song that you wrote them to sing.

A vapor delight.

How many
of your best portraits can back to taunt you? How many
of the feelings you loved
just were never true? Many see
only
exactly
precisely
we think that we need.

How many
portraits of others have you copied back from your memory,
and got it so wrong! How many
futures and pasts have you dreamt up for closeness and beckoning?
Many
never know anything more than a cold, quiet seed.

Come to earth,
sit in the dust and let it settle in.
You are earth. Dust, yes, and star-wind.
You are more than a shadow, a mist or a light,
and all of you's looked at in love and delight.
Do not love yourself, no, or anyone else as a vapor of what they should be!

Have you ever been somewhere
and it wasn't just right
but your heart somehow warmed like a fresh cup of tea?
You hear yourself singing
notes tender and bright
and another voice carries your melody.

"I like... the idea of people,"
the woman replied, gazing at herself in the lamplit garden pool.
She idly flicked in a pebble.

"Flighty things, aren't they?"
Her reflection dissolved into ripples
as she turned,
swiftly,
and left.