Below the river’s mirrored surface
Sun-catchers collect the eyes of fish
And in reflecting rainbows
Cast shadows through the currents.  

The slippers of dimpled stones
Tip-toe down-river-bottom
The same direction that the
Weeds blow.

Naked bodies that gleam blushes
Connect with the hot rocks
And rippled movements,
Each one dives into the cold clutches of aqua
Each one leaps on the rocks to lie in the sun.

The black and blue dragonflies,
They boast their fast flight
In full circles and angled turns
And from their deep-set ebony eyes
Pierce the spaces under rocks and between leaves.

Grains of sand are thieved from the shores
By the fast fleeing waters that do not
Stay in one place long.
Those under the water
Those that listen
Hear the music that is so subtly drawn with each grain of sand
Hear the music in the reflecting sun-catchers
Hear the foot-falls of every dimpled stone
Hear the music in the movements of those naked bodies
And in the speedy flight of black and blue dragonflies.

Darkness creeps over the waters
Of the Blind Rivers,
Making so that even the crane’s white silhouette
May not be seen catching fish in the shallows.
The breezes that belong to the sunset hour
Caress the blackened waters that are blind
And so cause silent waves.

A man sits,
Keeping company to
The crane,
And listens to the Truth behind
This landscape’s façade of uninterrupted quiet.

In the breezes,
He hears the last screams of those thousands  
Drowned in those waters.
He hears all the unspoken words
That should have been said.
He hears throat held silence
That the frightened hid behind.

In the darkness
He sees the contours of
Dreams never lived,
Cobble cities never built,
Books never written.
He sees the expressionless faces of many,
Whose eyes are gray and frightened
Whose mouths tremble to utter words
Whose skin is pale as canvas.

In the space surrounding the Blind Rivers,
Among the breezes that harbor screams,
Amidst the darkness that holds the unseen,
Alongside the white silhouette of the crane,
Sits a man,
Tired of the lies that construct this world,
At peace with solely himself,
And in solitude,
Sits as the sentry of Truth.

High-pitched sky songs
Pluck storms from their deepest
Heart of hearts
The thunders slap unto the cheeks
Of hill crests
Echo screams

The veins of mountains tremble
Final shivers shatter openings
Through the curved rock hips
Gushing waters that cry for release

Storm tongues strike root-deep
Oaks
And from ablaze flames
Release their lustful moans

Drowning tons of moist earth
Collapse over cliff walls and
In crashing descent bury some
Frightened fractals of life

The whole atmosphere is an orchestra
Of echoing screams and vibrational screeches
Releasing onto the tactual earth changes
That will remain
And form anew

Perpetual youth and old wisdom thrive
As the pure first breath
Of a child just born

Nature
An intricate web of
Perpetual youth and old wisdom

Mirrored halls
Each side I turn
I look back at myself

Marble floors
Each step I take
My feet send echoes through the stone

Cold air
Each breath I breathe
Throat moister transforms transparent

This temple of withdrawal
Harbors angels and demons
Angels and demons
Each one
Given space to ponder

Ivory white is the ground
That the snow foxes walk
Forever it has tasted cold
And only under the sun
Has it ever known a warm blush

The moon tries with all
His silver light to bestow
A blush to the snow’s cheeks
He refuses to understand
That he provides no warmth
He fights and fights
The truth that the sun
Is the only one that makes the snows melt

He chases his love in vain
Day in and night out
In a never ending circle
Around the earth

He cries his desires in the
Lightening that makes fires
He battles his emotions through
The changing tides of oceans

Try as he may
And fight as he does
The snows do not bow to his love
Only continue to melt
When the hot sun
Gazes upon her pale body

The air is stayed
By the hum of voices
They whisper through the divides
Between each leaf and branch
As smooth and unnoticeable
As the green beetles slow crawl and watchful eye

Voices trickle down the transparent
Curving body of the forest’s streams
Every caress the waters
Give to the rocks
Whose slippery surfaces are gowned
With moss so green
Chew more and more away
The cold stone

The vibration of every tone
Shakes the dome topped dew
Droplets from the blades of grass
That in the night’s closed walls
Grow still
With no wind to blow
No sun light to warm them

Nature thrives through these voices
As these voices thrive through nature
Nature keeps counsel with all life
And dances arm in arm with death

Life
Death
Nature
They resemble tapestries
That hung on the walls
Of medieval halls
Tapestries of three intertwining serpents
Each devouring the other
Forming a cycle
Of continuous rebirth

The beetle chews the leaf
The bird swallows the beetle
The fox eats the bird

The leaf falls from the branch
The stream carries it down its rapids
The fish nip at it thinking it is an insect
And the bird catches the fish

Particles are born
Angelical masks are worn
Tragic ends in lives are torn
And everything is reborn

An old man sits
On the curving trunk
Of an oak
His suede boots
Covered in thick dust
From his travels on
Unending roads
Through country hills and city streets
His gray cloak that at the beginning
Of his travels was
Dry and perfect
Now is discolored from the many rains
It had soaked through
And has ragged tears
Where there once were none
The once brown beard
That had been smooth and close-trimmed
Is now long
Weathered
And the color of ivory bone
Under the moonlight

Here sits the young boy
That climbed up the very
Tops of trees
Here sits the young man
That traveled where none dare go
And found riches that none shall know
Here sits an old man
Weary and empty of the burdens of youth
Here sits the three distant strands of one life
Here those three sit
In the form of an old man
Weary and empty of the burdens of youth
He, with his weathered cloak and suede boots
And a pipe in his mouth
Gazes out over the dusty roads of his travels