The fisherman tells the sea
that he promises to weather its storms.
The sea tells the fisherman
that she promises to carry him
to adventurous lands
upon her leeward waves.

As for me,
I promise we will be okay
as the winds blow the shingles
off our tiny, little house.
I promise we will be okay
as we follow the maps
and navigate the roads
while the radio sings static,
our hands clasped together
at your knee.

I promise that the rain
will radiate diamonds,
that reflect the gleam of your eyes,
onto the shores,
into the sea,
onto me,
and especially onto you.

We will find hope inside the clouds.

Promise me adventures.
Promise me we'll be okay.
I need that promise, the kind
the fisherman tells to the sea,
the kind you'll tell to me.

And when the wind blows
the shingles off our tiny, little house,
promise we'll take me to that sea.
I think we'll be okay
with a day by the sea,
where the wind will push us onward
and sometimes further than we imagined,
into the gray
and murky green.

Promise me with a map
and the road
and the static in the radio
Help me find the promise
in the static in the radio.
I'll see the promise and the ocean
and in the hands clasps together
at my knee.

And when we find hope inside the clouds,
promise me the rain
will cascade
diamonds
into the sea,
onto the shore,
and onto you
and even me.

Sit in a crowded gymnasium
on a Thursday.
Basketball is not the point.

Stare at the orange speck anyway.
Silence your phone and his voice from before,
Still inside your head,
words the color of the burnt orange ball.

Find music in the squeak of the rubber soles,
Notice the referee's slanting stripes, and how they blur
when you stare, until even pictures inside your head blur.
Nod to the man wearing the red cap beside you,
whose words dribble across your mind,

They imprinting a message:
travel
next year
last year
time
killing
foul
out
losses
hope.

Maybe you miss that last word,
Or maybe you see the message graffitied on the score board.  
Maybe you close your eyes and open them again,
And notice the white jerseys gleaming in song with light,
The same light that slants up toward you,
Your shirt should also be white,
With the same light shining on those who travel
and on those who foul out.

Sit in the crowded gymnasium
on a Thursday,
and forget about what he told you last night.

Tú te estiras
llevando la luz matinal
mi copa rebosa.

-----

You stretch out slowly,
wearing the light of morning
my cup runs over

I am a mountain stream,
alive in the midnight sun.
No longer dormant white,
I color the rocks with dappled light
as a keepsake for the magpie and the mountain.
I must run onward
tumbling towards the tree line,
begging rocks to let me pass.

They call me Susitna,
little traveller from the North ridge.
I carry pieces of the mountain Talkeetna,
a gift for my brother, the sea,
named Knik, who sends gilled messengers
speckled silver, white, and red
to welcome me home--
the mountain streaming
to the sea.

Why have you forgotten Him?
Oh, you soul of bitterness.
I stand on the dry land,
surrounded by those who sense your rotten scent,
Oh my soul.

It is not well
that I should perish
unable to drench your putrid mess in water
This desert cannot compare
to the deep, deep well
that I so desperately need.

Oh my soul,
Why are you so downcast,
Oh my soul,
unable to gaze up toward the hope
that could save.

This is not well
Crackled and brittle
Oh my soul, I stumble
with this thirst.

If only I could find a well
Where deep calls to deep,
But that kind of roaring showers of glory
isn't for us, oh my soul.
Is it for us?

Oh
my
God,
have you forgotten
me
and my soul?

I relinquish the breath in my lungs,
Throw to the dirt all that I am,
Oh my soul, please leave me alone.
But dirt turns to rock
beneath me.
And cold
becomes wet
becomes a trickle
becomes a stream.

Oh my soul.
The river has found me.
OH
MY SOUL.

I stumble into hope, into grace, into a river
flowing with life.
This is our hope,
Oh my soul.
Be clean,
Oh my soul.
Drink deep,
Oh my soul.

And it is well
with my soul.

Explorer of ink smudges and paper cuts,
She pilots her pen along the roads of a page.
With crisscrossed legs, she travels with windswept hair,
Scrawling to him on a route of blue and the red:
"Each moment we are together,
we write a new line of this poem."

He rummages through leaves of paper,
Words scribbled upon the pieces
like freshly fallen snow upon tree branches.
He searches in vain, seeing only her emerald-brown eyes.
Finally, with words at a breakneck speed, he writes:
*"And yet, there will never be verses enough
to encompass the scope of our voyage."