As a child I looked forward to my coming birthday
and the gifts I would receive
the attention and the new little boat
I had wanted
so I could float in joy
with them.

This morning I read poems of angels
of arm and heart scars
I thought of blood and its flow
not in a ****** mystery
but in the flow
of life and time
and how precious to me are both of these.

here I am in this piece of time allotted to me
in the warm currents
of your precious heart

He has been down the block
maybe even in another neighborhood
or an adjoining town.

I know he has been tracking us
keeping up with our movements
not a spy or even an enemy exactly
but my fear says he's close.
The other day when I fell
and thought I heard him whispering.

But I got up, am still walking.
Cooked spaghetti and meat sauce last night
cleaned the dishes
spoke to my beloved
kissed her before she went to bed.

Yet here I am typing before daybreak
barely half of my needed sleep.
I thought I heard his weight making the floors creak.
Is he in the house
or just my imagining?
His ambience hangs on me like stink.

The near approach of death is startling.

In spite of my raggedy self
I am a new creation each day
made by ever-flowing grace.

This terrain is unfamiliar
long vistas of green and golden fields
and to the side dark ravines
quicken alertness and care
to avoid hollow fruitless depths.

A gathering of souls
beckons me back to be among them
to tell of my journey, my vision.

But I carry with me shades of the ravine
attached as doubt.
Someone told me to be myself.
An odd order,
for who else could I be?

Still…
just about the time I think I know
my self
it is eroded by swift waters
sweeping by and into me.

I am in a land rich with growth
orchids and flowers beyond imagining
blue waters beckon
me to float upon them
and gulp refreshment and life.
I am planted in this land
humbly gathering in light
and smiling
with a peace
flowing in a mighty sparkling river
flooding my soul.

I’m wrapped in a netherworld
between fear and urgent turmoil
a shady region of late twilight
on the edge of dreadful night
what to do with the light.

Like the nightingale whose song
brings pausing, sadness, and hope,
blinking in a landscape of plains and *****
sadness of a creative life’s ending
a blending of sand and the hand of God.

My gut clinched in a tempest
rowing unknowing for shining sky.