Three days
Can be a lifetime
So they say

Three days
To burst forth from the deep,
Find a mate and die

Three days from death ‘til resurrection
We live in different worlds
Still, the pond holds your reflection

Low clouds scurry overhead
Dividing heaven and earth
The living and the dead

Cool mourning mist
licked my cheeks
I hadn’t cried in weeks

Now a new era erupts
Time measured out in coffee cups

Change, in my pocket
Already spent
Some unseen veil is rent

Sitting here in shade
Plans best laid  
Mice and men unmade

Deciding now which way they should go
To and fro

Hiding in this green protective world
Nature unfurled

Lining up dead limbs to mark the way
Nothing to say

Fallen tree blocks the old way through
As though he knew

Trimming trails no one will ever see
No one but me

Woods have sheltered me in tearful times
Hid beneath a Sugarberry bush
Keening, like the hawks high overhead
Accepting death in upturned turtle shells

Donkeys cross the dam
In somewhat single file
Meandering like a stream
Yet in one known direction

Their purpose made more serious
By their nonchalance
A dignity of being
Of knowing who they are

Backs toward the setting sun
Grazing green grass
Headed home, no hurry here
Though night is falling fast

They Shot the ******
I say they-I don’t know who
Though I have my ideas

The farmer up the creek
Whose pasture he has flooded?
For this his fur is blooded?

Perhaps the hunters saw him
And shot him just for sport
They seem to be that sort

This one is the third
Two more the other day
I loved to watch them play

He floats fully distended
By gas of dead for days
Like some new Hindenberg

I glide by in canoe
Kick him with my shoe
Launch him in the breeze

He floats on down the lake
A Viking burial ship
Dying for our sake

The daffodil cried out to me
Look until it hurts!
Your little eyes such foolish spies
Shall quickly feel my quirts

You never saw such sight as me
And never shall again
Beauty such as mine you see
Was not made for man

This sight you sought is dearly bought
Even though most wondrous
Those thus caught must be taught
Become my Erymanthus

Erymanthus was blinded by the goddess Aphrodite when he saw her bathing naked after she had made love to Adonis.

From ‘neath the dead brown leaves.
A burning bush has sprung
A fire of such bright yellow
Like looking on God’s face

How this old heart heaves
To know a thing so young
Could touch a frugal fellow
With gift of God’s own grace