I came exhausted
Out of the blistering gray,
Lungs choking dust,
Tongue parched,
Body swollen with heat.

Your cool gardens saved me.
Basked I in the tender greens of spring;
Nurtured, I lingered in the shade all summer;
Warmed, I stayed near your embers in autumn.
I would not leave the blazing logs in winter.

Dry and desperate my early plight.
Parched and stumbling,
Clogged by dust,
I found your water;
Drank and bathed,
Found solace in body and mind,
Found time to rest, to heal.

I wonder at the restlessness
Howling outside your gates.

Bryce impressed me with its "hoodoos,"
And we stood on a trail in the heated air,
Wondering how far
To venture into the depths below.

Zion's slotted canyon walls towered over us,
Cooled us in their shade,
Marveled us with seeping rocks,
Clinging lichens, plants in flower,
Tendrils hanging on the wet stone.
We left before a storm.

"Grand" is too quiet, too sparse, too short.
I stood on the precipice,
Miles and miles and miles in view,
Reds and tans and whites,
Clouds hanging virga.
My tears signaled gasping awe.

A woman dressed in black,
Shadow-hidden,
Deep woods at her back....

I caught her image
In the yellow headlights
Just for an instant.

My wheels rolled by
While my imagination
Slid to a stop with her.

Why was she there
On a lonely road
In freezing rain and cold?

A mile up the road I slowed,
Turned around to answer
Nagging questions.

At the point where she had stood
Remained a half burned stump
Five feet tall, a broken scar face-high.

I smiled at my imagination...
Nearly stumbled on a shoe:
Black, high heel sunk to the hilt.

A thousand miles west of me
She lies in a nursing home bed,
Oxygen and medications
Prolonging the end of a well-lived life.

This night, the weariness settles around me,
A grim comfort promising sleep,
If only I may close my eyes in surrender....
As if my staying awake somehow sustains her.

Eldest of her sons,
Sometimes wise,
Sometimes wiseacre,
Sometimes a visioning prophet,
Sometimes a fumbler in the dark,
I am empty of words tonight.

What wisdom have I now
When wisdom's called for?
Decisions to be made, and naught to say:
I'd give my kingdom for the wisest way.

Oh, I have prayed,
Have pleaded with the skies....
I suffer in the silent darkness.
Knowing Mother's youth and strength are spent;
Time's inexorable turning pulls her in,
Body nearly gone, reason razor thin
Tell me her fight's a battle Time will win.

But now, while the hovering remains,
The wretched anguish overhangs my soul,
And memories of Mother, young and strong,
Tireless and loving, industrious, filled with song,
Make poignant my pre-mourning hours.

Same old drudgery,
Papers fresh for grading;
Topics, seldom new,
If honestly presented,
At least encourage worth
In form, in format, in tradition.

Plagiarism creeps up,
Always shocking,
The unauthorized changing
Of voice, of tone, of diction,
Not unlike the sting of a ruthless needle,
The drip of a hollowed, poisoned fang,
The bite of frost, burning a tender cheek...
Sadly familiar, this strident pang.

All hope is lost.

Anger sets in,
Trust wilts,
Hope fades gray.

In plagiarism, the fool's truth lies;
To belie one's honor is to watch it die.

Fifteen years
These chimes have hung
Silent or clanging
To tell me the breeze
Is here or gone.

The bell tubes
Ring their mindless cheer.
Peacefully they bring
Me to the calm of emptiness.

The mindful other-where-ness,
I sense a kind of zen
But can't quite ken.

Making peace in the presence
Of a restless uncertainty,
Wind chimes ring.

Were I invincible or perfect or omnipotent.

But, I am none of these.

Chill wind, shivering frost, cruel sleet

Drive autumn changes in the breeze.

Tilting Earth announces endings,

Announces beginnings at her antipodes.

Death proves itself beneath the sleeping trees...

Feuille-morte beauty of the fallen leaves.