Soul Mountain Retreat #5

Jahrezeit

Morning mist rises.
Behind the trees clouds dark as mountains
edge their way elsewhere. Two yeas ago
today you left us, your heart winding down
as I sat at your feet. Where is
your spirit now?

I fall back into a deep sleep.
When I wake I have no idea
what time it is. The sky is still overcast
but leaves have come out on one--no two--
trees at the edge of the yard. I open
the window to birdsong.

Morning coffee on the glassed-in porch
where bees have wakened to Jasmine.
The porch is warm as a green house, but outside
April wind rattles the panes and stirs
the treetops, tosses the prayer flags
on their string tether.

In late afternoon I finally go out
to discover air warmed by golden sun,
much warmer than the shaded house.
Up the lane there is a woman who keeps
a menagerie--the Peaceable Kingdom she calls it:
horses, goats, llamas, an emu, guinea hens.

Her greyhounds are friendly and want
to follow me, but they are too polite. Perhaps
they sense your reluctance in me. "They're such kind dogs,"
Jane, their owner tells me. "You couldn't
race them if they weren't so kind. Otherwise
they wouldn't do what you ask."

On the way home I see
the first orange butterfly of the season
chasing a honey bee around a blossoming
shrub. Somewhere in flight, on the wind,
you are blessing me as I carry on, looking for signs
and wonders in the world you have left behind.