Everything hangs on love like the door on its hinge. Everything rests on love like the water strider on the pond ripples.
Like a carpenter planing a plank of wood, love makes the rough way smooth.
Like the sun at daybreak shining on the battlefield, love never gives up.
The sky is most beautiful as it tackles the dark— when light bends, curving like the arc of red-tailed hawk’s wing. Daybreak or day’s end, the horizon pools with color oozing like fruit ripening on the branch.
Though the shadow falls on the tree, when the shade lifts her wing, the leaf is still green, and tender, and ready to breathe, and bear light.
Love is frost. Love is rain. Love is river. Love is ice.
When you shut it out, it overflows to flood the hollows and the valleys.
Love wells as a spring flows. Because it draws on a deep source, love doesn't run dry. You don't need to ration it. Even if you build a wall to keep it out, it will flow around or under into new hollows and valleys. Love cuts as the river cuts, like a knife. Because it is powerful and sharp, one day love will erode the base of every wall.
When it happens in the moment, it’s never rehearsed; The props go missing; the child arrives headfirst Without midwife. The elements this time, not bread and wine, But hay and manger, ox and mare; the cupboards are bare.
Passersby will serve as witnesses, shepherded to the birth. The chorus will rally for peace on earth. Others, like the wisemen, will view from afar A disorder in the universe, a star.
But Love is never wasted or extinguished For love is like a fire. When flame is trampled Underfoot, the embers still persist: a spark Will flare into flame to overcome the dark.
For love is a fire, and those who light the night, They are the choir.
Not only fire
but aspens, too,
adorn the hills
with golden crown.
Lend me a mirror
that I might reflect this gold
for my heart is like
a barren branch.
Furnish me kindling
that I might light a fire
for my hearth is cold.
Golden leaves admit light
unlike the patches of green aspen,
shades drawn.
Last year, it was a maze
of stubby trunks in the meadow
where beavers had gnawed
young aspen trunks.
But now the aspen in the meadow
tower and chatter in the wind.
Oh, aspens, teach me your song.
Tender me your voice.
Course in my veins that I might
root, rest, rise with you,
and flame, fire, fall
like flint
that alights again.
Stars shine in the cold night sky
Lighting up the dark.
You were like a gentle rain
To my parched heart.
Day breaks after darkness fades;
Each dawn, a fresh start.
You were like a gentle rain
To my parched heart.
Lost my way without a compass
In a land without compassion.
In the dark you were my Pole Star
Found my way ‘cause of who you are.
Still grey clouds close in on me
Still storm clouds arise.
Rolling thunder, lightning strikes,
Tumultuous skies.
Hide me, like a bird, conceal.
Make your wing a shield.
In the storm you answer me
And your love reveal.
Lost my way without a compass
In a land without compassion.
In the dark you were my Pole Star
Found my way ‘cause of who you are.
Love is like a fire that burns
Scorching briar and thorn.
Open my heart and teach me love
Through the eye of the storm.
Love transposes chaos to calm
And our fear, disarms.
Open my heart and teach me love
Through the eye of the storm.
Lost my way without a compass
In a land without compassion.
In the dark you were my Pole Star
Found my way ‘cause of who you are.
Stars shine in the cold night sky
Lighting up the dark.
You were like a gentle rain
To my parched heart.
Bless these thy gifts,
these creatures of flesh and blood—
the raptors
who fish to satisfy their hunger
and never grasp at more;
The black bear
who walks on silent paws
streamside
past the sleepers in their tent;
The coyotes
whose playful chorus
echoes in the canyon.
Bless the canyon wrens
whose song is pure
as water cascading over rocks.
Bless the mule deer
who stand sentry round
the fawns bathing in the lake.
Bless the trout
whose rainbow stippling
glitters.
Bless the ponderosa saplings
birthed by fire.
Bless the cholla
who ask so little
and bloom so profusely.
Bless the multitudes of grasses,
the mute roots of the aspen,
the steadfast constellations.
And bless the great blue heron
who sings only when he’s startled,
and who has startled me
into song.
I am learning the art
of acquiescence. The leaf
doesn’t fight the river but floats.
The aspen along the riverbank
grows where it will and then bows
to the spruce as the trail narrows
toward the peak.
I am learning the art
of acquiescence. The blossom
did not resist the bee.
Though we could not see their light,
behind the storm clouds the stars
shone as brightly as ever.
The pencil submits to the sharpener.
The thread follows the needle
like a string
strung along by a kite.
Canyon beds pool with water
like a baptismal font.
Freed from the conventions
of dressing well, of housekeeping,
we plunge our sandaled feet
into the rushing stream,
balance on unpredictable rocks
clutch walking sticks.
Each step in the river recalls
previous summer trips
along the Gila Middle Fork.
Same canyons, same mountains,
same earth and rock,
yet the light that reflects
off the rockface is new.
Above us, the ponderosa needles,
sprouting green above charred earth,
whisper “all things made new.”
Heeling at our ankles,
the stream of swirling snowmelt gurgles:
“I’m not the same river.
You’re not the same man.”
You enclose me in your hand,
and like the needle of a compass
I find the way.
You alight on the water,
and like the snow goose
I wing it to the cornfield.
Your light shines at night,
mirrored in the sky,
and my feet find the path.
You gurgle in the stream,
and my ear guides me to the stream,
fed by snowmelt.
Your breath spins
clouds from ocean
to shade me from the heat.
When I am weary
you let drop ribbons of night,
like a mother hen
shielding her young
with her feathered shawl.
Once I prayed for snow on the mountains,
blossoms on the branch,
and fruit ripening in the sun.
Now I pray for my four-chambered heart,
pocked, bruised, beaten, broken open, like a fruit…
Oh, let it rise again after the frost
like the blood red Mexican hats dotting the open spaces.
Once I prayed for peace in the world.
Once I prayed for the valleys to fill with flowers,
for the rains to wash the mountains and fill the brooks.
Now I pray for the landscape of my heart,
that mercy and love and forgiveness
will wash over it all, that the well-worn ruts
will heal,
that I clear it of stones
like your clearing
the rice paddy field
of stones. See—
you stooped
and planted
and the grain of rice
multiplied.
Do you know who I am?
snowmelt in the canyon
water flowing down
Do you know who I am?
listen to the canyon walls
echoing my song
days lengthen
imperceptibly and water flows
like piano chords
winter standstill isn’t checkmate
listen closely to the hammer
and the nail splitting ice
sunlight melts the shadows
and like a bird that scrambles
from the fowler’s snare
water rushes down
water rushes down
Baking bread isn’t what it used to be:
We are learning together.
You examine the pizza dough and say:
“It’s risen.” You are as confident
as the faithful gathered on Easter Sunday
to celebrate the Resurrection.
I am the skeptic. I touch the dough,
still flat as a thick pancake,
and finger the crevices of the dough
like Thomas touching the hand
of Jesus. We leave the dough
to rise again, or proof. Perhaps
we will add rosemary, fragrant
and slightly bitter, to flavor the dough.
Our lives entwine with broken berries
of wheat, and bruised rosemary,
as we prepare the table
and anoint the dough with oil.
What does the dragonfly know
that I’ve forgotten? Skimming
effortlessly across the ripples,
it lives and dies without
even fearing the trout.
Cast your cares, we sing,
but the datura trumpets:
What do you even know
about total abandonment
to divine providence?
Think of water,
which all summer, swells,
seeks depth, runs down and deep,
and recklessly: so useful and
humble, precious and pure.
Hold nothing back,
the water gurgles: Give all.
Through snowmelt, waterfall, and torrent,
bathe the foot of hiker,
soothe the thirst of fawn.
Yet whether still or freefall,
water runs deep, seeps down,
like a nail, and then,
come winter, rises:
Ice now skates surface of pond and stream.
It stitches a dazzling bright robe,
and swaddles overwintering
flora and fauna—
Behold this liquid mirror
whose interlocking molecules of ice
transform murky streambed to dazzling glass,
and transfigure river’s
dank dark belly to pristine solid beam,
reflecting light of sky,
uniting water with light,
joining “I” with “you,”
fusing two elements
into One.
What is transfiguration
if not the seed streaked
with dirt and rain
rising from disheveled earth?
Petals, after a summer rain,
glisten in the morning light:
Thorny vine of summer unfurls,
and heavy fruit taxes the branches.
But before the blossom,
sweat and ashes—and oh
the weight of doubt.
Transform this wait,
and pining—cross I bare—
that I too might participate
in your transfiguration.
Light enters
the cornea
mysteriously
and scatters
an image
in our mind
as inconspicuously
as the approach
of the angel
in Mary’s room.
Sensing an abrupt
and warm presence,
Mary turns her gaze
to face the angel.
For a moment,
their two faces
like two globes
illuminate each other,
the eyes drawn to the eyes,
eternity suspended
in a moment.
Not since Jacob
wrestled with his angel
was so much splendor
at arm’s reach.
Did she flinch
even for a moment
at the task before her,
at the luminosity around her?
Quite as suddenly,
the angel retreated,
leaving Mary to ponder
what she could never forget
and never quite retrieve:
He is the Icon of the invisible God,
and the firstborn of all creation.
Let us bless the quiet
fleeting moments
shorter than breath
The sudden reversal of a swing
when everything hurtles you forward
The jolt of the coiled spring
when the slinky accelerates down a stair
The infant’s animation
reflecting its mother’s gaze
The rattle of the key
releasing the lock
Oh, let us bless the quiet
treasured moments
swifter than breath
The rustle of the startled heron
taking flight
The first ray of sun
chasing night
The quicksilver minnow
mirroring light
The force of the flower
breaking rock
And though these quiet
hallowed moments
are briefer than breath,
swifter than death,
lightning strike, or
the capricious twists
and turns of the river—
still let us bless
For who can measure
the riot and quiet
of everything we’ve lost—
yarn unraveled,
kitten tangled in string,
rough tongue of cat,
everything that flowed through our arms
like water through permeable rock
now vanished as sudden as thunderclap—
swollen stream after downpour,
peaceful interlude, water’s caress,
storm, stride, strike, stress—
these too may we bless
Everything lets go
in the end. The mortar
in the brick. The love song
of the finch
come fall.
Everything lets go
in the end, the spinning
of the top, the last drops of rain,
even the skin of the molting snake.
My dog jumped into the Middle Fork
of the Gila River
and reached for tiny minnows—
Out they swam between his teeth
and back into the stream. Everything
lets go, trickles down, heaves itself
into the ground. The motion
of the celestial spheres pauses each evening
for the stargazers, the knot in the wood,
the amber pearl of sap hardened
against the rough bark of the tree.
The thread lets go of the needle, the comb
releases the hair, the flame
absolves the wick. The lightning bolt,
and then the silence. Think of Jesus, his hand
washing Judas’ foot one moment,
and then he let it go.
Like Galileo, he knew the world stops spinning
when love catches you off guard.
To see is to believe.
To long is to hope.
Teach me to hope
for what I cannot yet behold.
Remember Galileo:
Before the telescope revealed
bright lights
behind the dark curtain of space—
already those stars
had overpowered
the dark.
So break me open in your hands—
pomegranate, bruised apricot—
seed me.
And breathe into me
the force
that powers
canyon floodwaters
at breakneck speed—
singing—
down the precipitous slope.
In another city,
another home,
I once swept the floor
for Mother Teresa.
She slept in that room
the following night,
and in the morning
after she had left,
a brother swept the room.
In the dustpan,
one hair.
I opened the thesaurus
and then I realized that hope
is just another word for hunger
and that—although I appease it
with the sweetest fruit
of the jungle, still,
like the cat at my ankle,
it will beg for more.
Yucca, rootbound porcupine,
stands at attention.
What are you guarding
with your green quills
straight as bayonets?
Did you ambush the juniper
with the camouflage needles?
You creep across the canyon
without tanks, refuel on sunlight.
Your fruit swells with the summer rain.
Clandestine plant,
you emerge unexpectedly
between sandstone rocks flecked with lichens
copious as the spots on a young cougar.
What secret do you oversee?
When the nocturnal moth emerges
from rosettes coated with pollen,
do you stand at ease?
No wind ruffles
your stiff leaves
as you stand sentry.
The infant wants milk, love, a lap, a lock
of your hair, the glitter from the lake,
even the moon. The child wants
a friend, a fort, time to play. The youth seeks
to divide and conquer, climb, achieve, win,
subjugate, wills to power and overpower,
even to exert the power
and influence to reject and scorn.
But then one day, whether by choice or force,
the adult releases, accepts, empowers
others.
Let my bones be a bridge, my hair
the buttresses in a nest, my dreams
wings for the creatures that fly.
Let my words be the ripples
that resonate in the pond
and then, more thinly, more
obliquely, in the air,
though I have no breath.
Aloft, they perch along the nest rim—
no longer nestlings,
nor yet fledglings.
For several weeks, their parents
have fed them, beak to beak,
swooping on blue-black wings
to siphon insects from the air, winged
insects so small I cannot see
them.
Hope, penned Emily Dickinson, is the thing
with feathers that perches in the soul.
But even so, hope is also the last egg
cradled in the nest, displaced only yesterday—
though its nest mates are nearly fledged now—
and cracked open on the tiled step:
The ants made short work
of its golden yolk.
In a cult, we all hold the same beliefs
or risk expulsion.
In a community, we work
together to find a solution,
despite diverging opinions,
and always hope to reconcile
with each other
when we start
to drift apart
Whatever’s happening in the world,
I know my yard is a community
where neither the stray cat
nor the lizard
can disentangle themselves
from their mutual obligations
and appetites, and yet,
the choreography of the dance—
between movements—
allows them to lie shoulder to shoulder
in the round belly of the earth
at last.
I once thought love is the mightiest
word but now I think perhaps the mightiest word
is hope. Oh, we love so freely, and with abandon.
We are so prodigal with our love. But hope
is the stubborn fortitude of the bud
holding on through frost and ice.
It’s the steadfastness of tree roots
carrying nutrients to the trunk and branches
of the tree, though its bark and branches
are already alight with lightning strike
or forest fire.
Oh, I want to be a vessel for the sap.
I want to be a seed
in the sharecropper’s hand.
I want to be the jellied eggs
of the spadefoot toad
there tucked in the shaded patch
of the puddle, and waiting—
in this drought-stricken land—waiting for
thunderclap.
Or, if nothing else remains, I want to be
that faint flame—cupped
in your hands—coaxed
to life with your breath.
Little victories:
It’s the first steps
that matter most—
the bud on the twig,
not the flower,
the nearly imperceptible
shadow on the grass
before the heel lifts
off the springy soil.
See on the wall next
to the entryway door,
the small beakful
of mud and twig
that clings to the wall
like soil to a rootball—
that twig and tiny portion
of mud, not yet a nest
but still more than clay and twig,
and no longer without life.
Even when you can barely hope,
Even when your heart is hardened as a fist,
Even when you cannot breathe,
Listen—
The flowers of the field,
The birds of the air
are breathing for you.
Even the seeds
deposited in the dark
earth of your heart
are splitting open . . .
and the birds perched in the eaves
have already deposited
a song, hidden in the egg’s
rich yolk.
It starts little by little—-a bit of windblown
dust, the rain, gentle at first, and then rainstorms.
Next comes the ice and the thaw
cracking apart the rock, oh the dust settles,
the wind blows, and alcoves form,
little hollowed chambers,
pulsing with light. Out of the rock,
shelter, like a hollowed ribcage, emerges.
Oh, you could sing in here, a lovely song,
a sad song, just choose your register.
And soon the alcove echoes
with the song of the cave swallow,
and then the song of the canyon wren,
whose appearance is as rustic as the robe
of a Franciscan friar, but whose song is as beautiful
as the sweetest song of Solomon.
And the canyon wren’s song never ceases, not even in winter.
Oh, what does the canyon wren sing? Beautiful liquid notes,
a rounded rock or pebble thrown into a pool of water
after the rainstorm, rockfall, downslope, snowmelt
rushing over red rocks in the canyon, think of chimes,
or lost loves. But what does the rock wall
of the canyon sing--
only heart-
break over rock worn down
by wind and rain.
What is prayer if not
the tree in winter
before the budding,
the frozen river
before the crack of the thaw,
the egg in the incubator,
the child—nose pressed against
the window—waiting…
the still red coal awaiting
the poker’s stir,
the icicle longing
to melt and flow into the river,
the monk in his cell.
What is prayer if not
the horizon
before the rosy finger of dawn,
the still cold air on the banks of the Rio Grande
before the winging snow geese lift off,
that heaviness of breath
before the monsoon,
the hunger in the belly,
the dissonant chord—unresolved,
oh, the ache of it all,
the water not yet wine.
There were some that I loved,
but they didn’t love me.
Then you said: “Look! Stand here!”
and we looked at the light.
You noticed it first.
Sunlight glowed red reflecting off the red rock mesas.
I thought how every evening the sun shines off the rocks
yet goes unnoticed. Who thanked the flower in July,
when she offered her breast to the bee?
I thought, Nothing is wasted, ever.
Even the deepest crevices
of the red rock mesas reflect light
when the sun sweeps over their surface
like a broom. Oh, every crumb
is swept up-not a crumb of love
is wasted, ever. In summer, the roots
of plants tangle to crack
rock and absorb the light of sun.
So in winter, rocks mirror light.
See how the disheveled red rock
bares herself like a chrysalis
revealing her colors!
In summer, when we climbed
the white cliffs, swallows had moved in
and built nests on the rockface,
and we watched cliff swallows
dive and tumble through air.
As we ascended the mesas,
our footsteps barely left a trace.
Now our dreams, battered as a nest
in winter storm, hang by a thread.
Oh the bee is petulant, but the petal,
though now a memory, has sent
her love letter to the world:
In the hive, the honey:
beneath the rock,
the seed.
Angels fracture the dome of sky like rock shattering ice.
Shepherds eye the chorus, bewildered, by heaven’s strange lullaby.
Thick are the branches that block our way.
Restless feet, and hunger, the measure of our days.
But hope startles like the song of a canyon wren.
Roots carve a crib for the desert stream.
A stable gives berth to tired travelers.
A child’s midnight cry is the unraveling.
Shepherds’ rough hands cradle holy mystery:
The boy child of Mary, and the rough carpentry
Of burl and sap, manger and nativity.
Midnight rustle of wings, doves perching in the rafters—
Where shepherd and child meet, love and longing gather.
Even the dove, resting in the rafters, murmurs gently, ever after.
The rock does not cling to the river,
but yields
to snowmelt.
Rain surges to fill the emptiness:
the hollowed out space
of our tracks—
the bowl of the earth
where we slept,
the bed of our pitched tent.
Where would we be
if we didn’t keep losing ourselves—
to each other,
to the days we left behind?
Everything that escapes our grasp—
the fish in the river,
the breath we exhale—
returns, I’m told.
Even the sea returns to shore
continuously,
like the swing of the pendulum,
as she licks her wounds.
Will we recognize the fog
as last year’s puddle
as transpired sweat
as a little ghost of ourselves?
Remember how the clouds
gave themselves up.
Then do likewise
Like Alice, I have been falling
and my feet still haven’t touched ground.
Like a golden ball flung toward the horizon
I fall without a sound.
See me shapeshift into ribbons
with arms wide as the sun.
Deep inside the earth’s core,
magma buckles and mountains peak.
Give me a lever long enough, wrote Archimedes,
and I could move heaven and earth.
See how the universe expands into the darkness,
carrying with it light beyond the Milky Way?
As we drive west across the Continental Divide,
neither smoke of wildfires nor soot of car exhaust
can block the muted rose of the sun’s rays,
last hurrah before nightfall. Oh the shadows
are always with us as they seek to block the light,
yet ribbons of pink and peach persist,
lingering on the horizon.
Like abalone or mother of pearl,
we are both castaways—
the sun’s ray on cold rock of earth—
the marine shell stranded on distant shore,
deep indigo of the ocean
now shipwrecked on the sandy beach,
muted colors of pink and peach unfurled
in the contours of the abalone shell:
a distant mirror of the sun.
Along the rain-soaked trail
next to the wild strawberries,
I balance my backpack
to reach for tasty red fruit,
each crimson berry
small as a thimble.
The act of foraging,
a balancing act:
Next to me:
fresh bear tracks.
I don’t know how to distinguish flowers
by their sweetness
save by following the bee.
In a field overflowing
with flowers, the Indian paintbrush
grows in shades of scarlet, purple,
pink, and cream, and I follow
the bee to the sweet spot:
the cream-tipped stalks,
and where the bee sucks,
there suck I.
Amanita muscaria alongside Elk Creek Trail in Colorado’s San Juan Wilderness
In the tent, chaotic dreams emerge,
like pikas darting from their den.
Was that an airplane flying overhead,
or traffic? I hear a crash. “He’s dead,”
someone cries. Car doors slam.
Feet scurry down the slope
from the isolated highway.
Flashlights shine, illuminating the walls of the tent.
“Wake up! Wake up!” the voices cry.
“Can we borrow your phone?
We need to report an accident.”
I know we’ve left phones behind in a locked car.
No service here in Colorado’s San Juan Wilderness,
and the nearest road
is more than 8 miles
from our tent site.
In my dream, I ask my husband
for his phone. I shake his arm.
His eyes open, and I ask:
“Are you okay?
Did you hear anything?
See anyone?”
Roused from my dream, awakened from our sleep,
we shed sleeping bags, like cocoons.
We unzip the tent, then step out.
Stars shimmer across the meadow-—
Second Meadow—-as it arches its sinuous back
for two miles alongside Elk Creek Trail.
The stars are luminous and thick
as fireflies from my childhood.
Soon, it’s back to the tent.
We zip closed the screen behind us,
but the moon’s reflected light
penetrates the opaque fabric
of our tent, thin sail hoisted on a meadow,
like shining from shook foil.
I knew a lady who sat outside
a mut hut concession, opposite
a marsh where breezes blew
palm fragrance in her face,
to wait for alms. She leaned
against a neem shade tree
whose roots exhausted soil.
I think she kept a garden of her own,
although her fingers may have been
misshaped for tilling earth.
At any rate, she needed change
for pharmacy antibiotics;
passing on my way to church,
I’d drop coins into her hands.
I remember Sunday mornings
spent in a baobab’s shade,
clapping and signing of converts,
a young man telling gospel,
but most of all, a leper-lady
whose fingers curled with leprosy
like soft peeled bark. Her
fingers could not feel my hand
or anything that came their way.
I wish I had the healing gift.
All I could do was spare pennies
for those outstretched hands,
roses where no thorns are.
After 15 months’ hibernation, the tents
put up sail again—quietly at first. Then,
with weekend’s arrival, wayfarers’ feet
stir up dust on the disused path.
Chromatic colors of sneakers, strollers,
scarves, and baseball caps circulate
around flea market stalls. Even chihuahuas
appear, resting in the arms of their humans,
and a young child balances a piglet
in his arms as he examines handmade beaded jewelry.
We fist bump. We shake hands. And the conversation
is all: “You made it! You’re here!”
The smell of roast mutton and roast corn
wafts between stalls selling acrylic paintings,
gospel CDs, silver, turquoise, herbal remedies,
flour sack aprons, T-shirts, mugs, fossils, rocks.
At one stall a woman displays a loom
with her half-finished rug, reminding us,
perhaps, that the work is done, yet undone.
A stack of baby quilts is testament, not only
to long hours at home under lockdown,
but testament to hope.
At the Gallup Flea Market, the old blends seamlessly with the new:
the handwashing station, the newly built stage for country bands.
I buy baby quilts for two friends and leave before the dance,
but by day’s end, I scroll through photos of couples, dancing,
their eyes disclosing hope, the crinkles of their eyes, smiling.
The blue heron lives a solitary life,
or so it seems, perched on shore,
peering at its reflection,
like a chess piece pondering checkmate.
Then, in one swift
movement, swoops, lifts,
and wings
toward the wood,
whose silence
is pierced
only by the cry
of hungry beaks.
The weather changes
by the hour.
The wind changes
by the minute.
But my heart is Rock—
pierced, split, and cracked
only by the sprouting Seed
planted by your Hand.
On the steppingstones that cross the creek
your boot left tracks thin as cat whiskers.
“Leave no trace,” they say.
And though, one day, we will leave no trace,
for now, we pack out trash
and secure our gear on limbs
sturdy as the saplings
the beavers gnaw for their lodge.
One day we will leave no trace,
but even so I like to believe
we will leave behind
something of who we were,
something of who
we hoped to be.
A flower’s a labyrinth
for pollinators.
A sapling’s
a log for a beaver.
A riverbed’s home
for the snowmelt.
The belled flower,
a beacon for the hummingbird—
who jostles among
uplifted stalks
but never visits for long,
who sips while suspended,
a flurry of wings,
who resists capture
even by photograph—
I came to a field
of flowers, seeking
nourishment, like a bee.
Those we love
never seem to know
how much we love—
The bee hovers over
the bee balm
the way I listen to
Einaudi, the way I
crave you.
The tree offers shade
with roots deep
as mother’s love.
The tree shades us,
her leaves, a manufacturing
plant for chlorophyll
but even they, powerless
without the deep work
of the roots.
The roots never
upstage the leaves,
nor even the branches.
More so,
like the unsung toil
of rootball,
or heart’s muscle,
so much of
the work of love
is hidden.
terimuso: Poetry by Tammy Iralu 