I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth's sweet flowing breast;
A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in Summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose busom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.
a cormorant weaves
into and over water:
no trace but ripples.
From the hilltop,
one can watch nature reclaim:
green grows up the glass,
tufts sprout from each crevice
and the man-made world is crevice-laden,
one seed blown into a mortar crack
will become a wedge --
a sprout that splits stone.
Concrete and steel prove
digestible:
time, water, oxygen,
the enzymatic requirements are few.
Fungi blooms from a pile-full of dung.
I don't know whether it's a desirable meal,
whether our trappings & vestiges are
haute cuisine,
or merely a meal
of convenience.
This place was once with us.
Now, it's hidden so well
that it's become a myth,
a once firm and tangible thing --
now invisible & conceptual.
Nature swallowed our world
and farted our mythos.
O sweet spontaneous
earth how often have
the
doting
fingers of
prurient philosophers pinched
and
poked
thee
, has the naughty thumb
of science prodded
thy
beauty how
often have religions taken
thee upon their scraggy knees
squeezing and
buffeting thee that thou mightest conceive
gods
(but
true
to the incomparable
couch of death thy
rhythmic
lover
thou answerest
them only with
spring)
ripples march
across the glassy river --
faced by a reed phalanx.
the flowers hide
in tall grass & sedges,
but bees still find them.
All day long, clouds hung low
(pretending rains would come)
but never did winds blow --
and no rain came, therefrom.
"Oh, duplicitous sky,
why have you lied to me?"
It offered its reply,
"What grand audacity!
"You left your umbrella home.
So, what else could I do?
But close the azure dome,
and some respect accrue!"
Tiger Riding for Beginners 