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Posts Tagged ‘mountains’

Somewhere You Feel Free

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on July 26, 2021| Leave a Comment »


You belong among the wildflowers.
            —Tom Petty, “Wildflowers”


Standing alone
in a high and steep meadow
surrounded by a million million
pale purple asters,
a person might be,
at least for a moment,
a many petaled thing,
might know the blue sky
in a new blue way;
might want to visit the self
as curious as a bee
stepping into the golden center
of things. What luck
to climb into beauty,
to stumble into
the self greater than the self,
to forget for a moment that worry,
that burden, that loss,
and simply purple, to wildly
purple, to purple with abandon,
to purple without thought,
to humbly purple,
to purple.



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On Red Mountain Pass

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on June 21, 2020| Leave a Comment »

 

for C, A, A, A and J

 

 

I want to share with you a trail with no map

and the clean scent of spruce and a clear Colorado sky.

I want to spend an afternoon above tree line

in a field of corn lilies and alpine buttercups

the pica chirping brightly in the rockfall.

Let’s not find the lake we were looking for.

Let’s stop where our feet say stop.

I want to share a leap and a shimmy,

a chocolate cookie, the mighty salt of love.

I want to slide down snowfields on our raincoats,

to find more paths to take another day,

to wade through the cold rush of change.

I want to take a bolt cutter to any door

that won’t let us in, to let the ears of my heart

attune to your words, to lose our hats to the wind

and find them again. And as the night

fills the room, I want to sing as the guitar

of friendship finds a new tune. I want to hear it

play on long after the day has gone.

 

 

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With Any Luck

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on June 17, 2016| 1 Comment »

 

 

 

Meet me in summer

when the mountains

are softened by fields

of blue lupine

and the creeks run clear

with the memory of snow.

With any luck,

we’ll get lost until

we, too, begin to bloom,

until whatever is cold in us

melts and races away

with a bright and bubbling laugh.

There are days we forget

how to make a fist,

how to speak any language

but praise. Meet me

in summer when the old

high trails are open—

what else might we find

behind the crumbling

mines—some share

of ourselves we’ve yet

to have met—something

so spacious we never

dreamt it would fit

inside our skin.

With any luck,

it will follow us home.

 

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Late June in the San Juans

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on June 21, 2014| 1 Comment »

Just because it’s the longest day of the year
doesn’t mean that the bean sprouts in the garden
won’t freeze tonight. Again. As they did last night.
And two nights before that. So I water them.

I water them real good, for I am still shocked
and delighted that the process of freezing creates
a degree of heat. Every time I consider that fact,
it stuns me. It’s like a joke that makes me laugh

no matter how many times I have heard it.
And though it’s all rather predictable amongst the rows,
what comes up when and what the frost will kill,
it is always new. I never stop marveling at the pure

determination of those tiny leaves as they thrust
through the hard dirt crust. And marvel again at their
vulnerability on nights like tonight when the wind
gets lost some other where and the stars shine clear

in the cold night air and the frost doesn’t care
if I’ve planted the beans again. And again. The earth
spins on its invisible spit and summer goes on
as it always does, different than it’s ever been.

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Step by Step by Step

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on March 30, 2014| 1 Comment »

It’s a dead end, the road.
But that is only the road.
At the end is a trail
that will lead you past
the waterfall, up through
the larkspur, waist high,
up past the turquoise
glacial lakes. And then
it ends, the trail. But
that is only the trail.
The mountains do not
end. There is the scree field
to scramble on. Clamber
up to the ridge, and then there
is over the ridge, but it is not
over, this journey. Were you
hoping that it was done?
Looking for a reason to turn
around, retrace your steps,
go home? Look. No
matter which direction
you go, you are already home.

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Three Crazy Haiku

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on February 3, 2012| 1 Comment »

Every part of me
burning and still, go figure,
I feel lucky.

Lost and scared, still
the only thing that makes sense:
fall deeper in love.

Light spills all over
the mountains—oh morning, please
kiss me like that.

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