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 Dec 2017
CA Guilfoyle
I think it quite strange living here walled by this house
when I was wilder than now I lived in nature
stalking birds and pollen laden things
always my toes in sands or hot footed in summer.
I was in love with the sky, no matter the weather
in storms I hid beneath branching cedars
sleeping on mossy pillows, in the woods of my backyard.
I never gave much thought to houses then, I only went there
to sleep or eat and waited to leave again
waited for an inkling of sun to warm the cold grass
spent days climbing trees, red plums and cherries
I imagined that's how life would always be,
living outdoors under the sun or clouds
wet with rain, always picking flowers.
 Dec 2017
Skye Marshmallow
There is something so distinctly vulnerable
About the naked trees in a winter forest
Hugging tight as one againest the frosty mornings
Whilst the christmas robins sing out their chorus

Scars exposed, out in the open
Pain not hidden but highlighted
Through the beautiful intertwining of branches
Their freedom no longer blighted
 Oct 2017
harlon rivers
The blustery east wind
gathers the fragrant  
Warm Springs
high desert
mountain sage,
cascading
downhill
through
Dry Creek pass
surging downward
from above
the Hood River valley,
with breath of sky's bouquet
of billowing
aromatic avalanche,
gushing
of heaven's zephyr

The poignant
sudden starkness
of fiery autumn leaves
letting go
whirling ― falling
helter skelter,
pushed urgently
flying westbound,
beckoned franticly
by
distant whispered
ocean bellows
blowin' in the winds
    of change ―

Adrift across
Parkdale
mountain meadows,
Coyote  bent,
paw trodden
ripe sweet grasses,
pungent  with
waft of mountain sage
and fermenting apples fallen ―
the waxing silence
of the marvelous moon
echoes  just beyond
the Lost Lake of the Woods,
its golden orange crescent
dances on clear lake ripples,
high perched
sky reflection lapping
the moon kissed shoreline

 ― alone ―  

The Sliver of the Moon,
skinny lithe
unripened youth
arching
as unsated
       summer love  ―  
sage memories
waxing and waning,
whiffs of honeyed Jasmine
writhing witherings,
coalescent

    time drifts onward ―   

unstoppable changes
never turning around
looking back
to see
their fading reflection
    recurring ―

  

august rivers 2017

note to self:
September 15, 16 east wind
Breathing Waft of lingering Mountain Sage
another Autumn soon comes

... and I'm getting older too
When our senses are heightened, do you ever think about the journey of the stimulus(?)!  like the path of scent or even smoke...or a distant sound.
How far is the distant horizon you see...even how far away can we be touched (?)! in its many realms...

Just stuff in drafts...
all these are real places
on the long road home

All habitat at Mt. Hood's fingertip reach
in Oregon, North America
Home of the devastating Eagle Creek wild fire of 2017
In the treasured western scenic Columbia River gorge

Waft of Mountain Sage
Written by:  h.a. rivers
 Sep 2017
Raven
read this slowly
in the intent to feel as though
your big toe stands on top of the highest peak
and attempt to spin
sweeping the air
and you are allowed to smile as wide as the sky above
and you may grasp the blades that make your shoulders
feeling safe,
you might feel alone.
The distant hollow of the high mountain pass
swallows the setting sun as it steals away southbound
behind the coastal mountain's tangerine sunset hued silhouettes
Mulberry plashed shadows pointing northward
across the evergreens outstretched dimming,
beneath the waning fade of each fleeting eventide

Sundown ebbing asunder the wafting daylight,
each gloaming of the day, helplessly a moment sooner past,
transfixed further south beyond yesterday's passing azure
The lazy days of summer escape unbounded,
nomadic as the sea I've seen sail away before;
evanescent as the beauty of the bloom summer days beheld
and the memory of the fragrance they exhale

The nebulous weight of the gravity is consciously denied
by the truths a human heart beholds
A moment’s epiphany afflicts like a rogue wave in a calm sea;
the only thing my heart ever wanted remains out of reach

Everything my heart needs consciously surrendering
to the poignant passing moment's beauty,
the falling sun at distance sets more suddenly now
Lost in the undeniable certainty
life's imminent season's change

Eyes drawn stubbornly from presence to a sky so far away,
knowing there'll be no restitution for the welling sense of loss...
A bitter sweet song mummers in the silence of the absorbing spell,
summer's sun stained pages of watermarked soul scribbles,
time tattooed reparation for the indelible ache
of a harsh grey winter loneliness

Perhaps too familiar, this whelming Déjà vu
that tears my soul;     that tugs at these roots
but cannot sever their sacred grasp
But for now, eyes fixed to the sun's
inevitable tightening tether hence —
to wear weary each fraying thread's  impending break

Each sunset leans a deeper angle southward
as it slips down through the firwood shadows;
illuminating other faraway latitudes
far beyond the distant horizon skies

The preordained continuum unfolding what will be ...


someone you used to know ... September 11, 2017 ... 7:30 PM
 Sep 2017
Mary Pear
Oh little bud upon the bush
Give one more push!
And poke your salmon coloured nose
Through the green cap that grows
To keep you warm and dry.
It holds you tight
And lets you see the light
You need to help you grow.

Don't touch this bud!
Just let it be and let it grow just so
No peeling back the sheath
To see its colours. No forcing heat, no elongated day
Or shortened night.
Just let the thing unfold.
It is itself.
It is not yours or mine.
It is its own.

If it is red we must not wish it pink
Or think that it is ours
To **** or pinch.

We can and must protect from harm
And shoo the greenfly.
We must keep it warm
In winter
Feed and water it.
But it
Is of itself.

And as it peeps
And shows its colour
We can 'Ooh!' and 'Aah!'
And love the thing it is.
And as it grows
And spreads its petals
We can look
But never touch its velvet softness
Less we leave a mark.

Left alone it reaches to the heavens
Opens
Drinks the sun and rain
And thrives.

Then in  its own time
When  the petals have reached out
To let the pollen dusted butterfly and bee take of their fill.
One by one, full ripe and satisfied the petals fall
And for awhile their beauty and their scent
Leaves soft remembrance.
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