Two painful events led to a hospital
and a team of cardiologists, lots
of tests ensued, a plugged artery
in my heart they informed, a stent
procedure in a few days will hopefully
solve the problem and I can get back to
normal living, normalcy you see is a very
good thing. Not to be taken for granted.

As the crow flies, my farm is less than two
miles from the Willamette River that flows
deep and brown through the fertile valley
of the same name, in Northwest Oregon.
From my porch upon a hill, I have views
out over that valley looking east and north
and as fall comes around, early morning
light and dampness transfers hints of rich
river scents, this added moisture paired
with the absents of wind pervades and
manifests an enveloping shroud of silence,
with low moving banks of slow white
ghostly ground fog that renders striking
visual contrasts to the landscape, with its
stands of emerald evergreen trees, and
autumn dressed orange and yellow leaved
varieties of deciduous ones, along with
sculpted brown newly plowed fields.
Another of Nature's own fleeting ever
changing painted canvases that never
disappoints.

One must rise early at first light on these
chilly morning to witness this seasonal
panoramic scene, but it is always worth
the effort. And what the heck, I'm retired,
I can snap some photos and always crawl
back into my nice warm bed to sleep, or
merely cogitate on what I've been witness to.

That old clock is ticking away,
the days bleed on one into another,
mostly all the same, nothing much
new to report here. I do what I can,
what my aged body will allow.
A limited return on my investment
I guess, but still finding little joys
that sustain me, mostly given up
on big dreams and illusions, anyway
being rich and famous was never on
my wish list agenda, all in all it's been
a very good run, with strong family
love given and received, our linage
prospers and continues, that is after
all the only real reason any of us, man
bird or beast were put on this earth.

To believe otherwise is but a
human delusion that in the end
matters not in the least.

Some poems never end,
Nor were meant too.
Alliterative phrases, invitations,
Add a verse, a word, even a sound,
An exclamation of delight,
A stanza in its own right.

Unfinished work, forever additive, collaborative.
Modify mine, pass it on,
Free to steal it,
For ownership passes to you,
with your first reading,
And lost when you close it,
Stamp it and release it into the atmosphere.

But some poems do. End.
Unique and distinct,
Pockmarked-faced at birth.
Owned by my initials,
Never to see the shelves of a
Lending Library.

Like this one:

Cannot remember a single day
When suicidal thoughts
Were not heard clearly above the fray
Of jingle-jangled, responsibilities
Demanding my immediate attention.

The end.


NML

leaves loosen from limbs
and the smell of apples sweetens the air

I follow you to the top, to the peak. You  laugh and I know
we are for each other in this life,

despite the weather, the path, the season.