Just one really good afternoon with you
was all it took to knock the solid rock
loose from my blockhead.
I remember love now,
though I had almost forgotten it
in this year of tragic loss and fear.
I was alone in my room with no one to hear me.
You brought me near enough to the river
to sense its silent joy.

You and the water
are always there shining for me.
She touching me gently
with sweet caresses of an embrace.
It’s here I see your face
breaking through the water’s surface.

At the height of summer
when the water doesn’t run cold
and cicadas and crickets rule the evenings
I think of sandpipers on beaches
loudly ringing their whistled calls.
We are all in symphony,
running in tandem,
all cause-and-effect
with the ebb and flow
of our energies wrought by sunlight.

What will you sell me
for my pockets full of dust and ashes?
A ride on your captured elephant?
Two bales of hay?
The loaves and the fishes?
Me, who asked you
into my heart
to dwell in an acre of sand.

On deck will I dine tonight
eating limes
and salt pork from a barrel.
I must always remember
that we are no longer
on the S.S. Britannia,
but moving now by wind,
in a wooden boat
on freshwater.

Papyrus cannot hold the lifeblood of words
spilled from even a half-full glass;
the empty half housing dreams unmanifest,
ideas yet to be considered,
and races not yet run.
I will take the ink blotter
to the sticky, red page,
mop up the edits off the floor
and combine these sanguine liquids
with Saturnian whimsies
and a bottle of wry whiskey.

High sunbeams shine
on nearly still water.
They know how to dance
in their own noontime light.
August graces
bring radiance to substance
as the peach glows rosy
with the brightness of its skin.
Grapevines entwine
weaving their leaves and fruit.
Blueberry wine will flow
through this shallow valley