For this bird
these woven feathers into web
of silken sage your home.
Silent you sleep, soon slips
the shell and falls the day
the evening of your life
with monsoon winds
your wings of flurry flutter
tiny flash barley seen
heart of ruby
feathers of
green.

Tonight the wind
the pouring rain through trees
hiss and whistle of kettle
water poured for tea
the lashing winter willows
this coal, dark storm that blinds
and hides away your face
and any trace of moon.

a million birds singing
the wind warm as sun
all the branches glowing
we wait the buds to come
the bending leafy willows
brush the melting pond
of blue green water
beneath the cold dark earth
roots encased and safe
breathe green where
flowers form.

The drape of blue, green vines

that hung and fell with beads of water perfume

of birds and flowers long since bloomed.

Chilly winds lift feathery fronds

of red and rust on autumn ponds.

A shadow of summer

where sandhill cranes have flown.

A fallow field hazy in its gold and brown

stiff blades and grain that brace the cold

Alas snowflakes

soft as feathers falling down.

Who writes of me
without pad nor pen
or scribes with sharpened knife
a belly of lies unfastened from sheath
deep that bores the core of heart?
Illusions swift they swim
in waves as shoals
spawned from
tiny minnows.

Early in the dark hours
where no birds have flown
before the flicker and hum of stars
silence where daylight sweeps away
the cold occluded moon
amid a barren white velvet
a silhouette of trees
caked in winter.

In the rain forest we heard the first birds
stood amid the cooling spectral fog
walked upon the spongy ground
the layered earth of moss and mud
along the path and further on
came streaming rays of sun
that silver lit the wild paphiopedilums
smiling toward the sky
a shine of silken stars.