Part I: You Belong Here.
We Too Can Fly
Oh, heron, how you spread your wings as you cast yourself as a sail
with greyish hues that fill
How you soar above the rust like an arrow released
true and sure
How you offer yourself to the world abundant,
clear in your intention in crisp blue skies
There is magic in your flight in your command
in your fluttering perch at the foot of the bend in your legs outstretched
eager and poised
Oh, how your head bows
comely, as it gazes upon the river’s mouth
content with its place in the world to remind us
we too can fly
All My Life I Have Been Restless
You look up, aching to float as the red kite does feathered against the white
What bounties has it come to offer?
A sense of restlessness
like smoke that hangs against the cold night
What is it you hope to seek when all is said and done? What is it you look for, deep within the light?
As you turn, so does the world so do the trials and errors
gaining momentum
growing bigger like black dogs gnarled and empty as ever
panting on baited leashes
taut enough to snap
I heard they came across the ocean looking just for you
you who are always restless
like the hermit crab who gleans across the shore’s bed looking for a new home, but see
there is only dirt and bones
First look and see yourself— What you look for is truth your truth
and when you find it build your temple upon it
take up roots in it
grow strong with it
and stronger still
Meanwhile the red kite still soars as restlessly as a floating sprite
Meanwhile the winds still blow and offer you to flight
Dales
Down boney paths, along rolling deep
And into emerald views
lies a world at rest, breathless
A patchwork quilt of auburn green
sewn along with hand-pitched walls
as shadows dance on a hilly canvas
from high-floating cirrus clouds
We’re merely visitors to this secret country
where much has been reaped and sowed
Tups graze upon your fertile soil
you give in deep repose
My only wish is to breathe you in and take you back with me
and so I return to draw every breath and count every dewdrop at my feet
The Tyne
I know nothing of this
but to see with my own eyes a monolith of deep blue
as sea and sky meet endlessly
The gulls that sweep across its sheets
puffed chests that guard the horizon:
I have been here my whole life
as the brume spreads on for eons
The sea itself, a gentle whisper of ebbs and flows
I see upon it a shimmering web,
a single fishing boat out near the horizon
on a gallant or careless mission,
you decide
The salted air clings to my nostrils and wakes within me a primitive beast
an echo that longs to be out in the tug and pull
an echo that sings back to me
You belong here in front of the sea as open as you
as deep as you
as hungry as you
It rises and falls with your every breath broken and glistening
carrying out and bringing in
the eagerness that comes at first light
to float like the fishing boat
on a quest towards your own catch.
Opal Blue
Ardently she sings in opal blue
tawny foxes
in stubble shrews
A whisper still
comes hurdling through
open tunnels, a burrowed sleuth
Nothing beating can ever keep
owlets ready
with gritted beaks
She drops swift as a knife
cutting through the coral light
her wings are spread
but not a sound
a scurried prey, for death is bound
To hear the silence that comes before
to catch its breath forever more
a tail does hang in snared-up fists
as eyes glow amber in wooded mists
Her head is turned she is quiet now
and drops the feast by owlets’ brows
her work is done, a holy sprite
as opal blue now paints the night
The Tide
Once I tried to seize the spindle
of ocean’s ebb and flow
held up by coral moon’s allure
a hymn called to me
The drift did sway and swept the tenor
which carried crashing spume
hard as I rowed,
I made no gain left stranded beyond the blue
The tide will crash and undertow
will take whatever it may please
I learned that day the grace of sailing and in the drift of things
To push against the mighty pull yields no reward or peace
Listen to the quietude
It will take you where you need
And when I stopped the ocean spoke “Everything is divine”
Your struggle ceases only when you stop pushing against the tide
The River of Gold
The air is cooled by the Douro
as it sweeps heavenly across my cheek
It’s August now
and my drink and forehead are beading
as the droplets consume each other gain speed and eventually
sink
There are voices in the distance raw and full of energy humming as if one being
Hooligans clamor to the dragon’s song as the streets fill with blue and white Ribbons pulse and drums beat along
another win and the city erupts
As I walk the cobbled roads uneven and worn
I see a busker, each more elaborate than the last
Fado sweeps the streets intricately always downhill towards the center inviting you in generously
just as I reach the ribeira
I am stopped
By boys jumping off the steely bridge brave and careless
testing their courage as they splash into the darkness below
For a moment all is lost
Then appearing with a sudden swell bobbing in and out of the cool
spider-like, scaling the banked walls
they return to their perch
eager to take flight again
Asking only for a euro in return to repeat the spectacle once more
and this is how their summers are spent
accumulating audacity in the river of gold
Póvoa
I return to the cobbled roads and unfamiliar faces
a town in which my story began my thread is frayed and yet
still part of the quilt
A man in the red tractor passes by twice a day on the incline that defeats most cars
as I look on from the porch side
Later in town, the bronzed Maria the revolutionist stands watching
We drink from chipped bowls at long tables of indistinct chatter
a sense of belonging slowly builds
In the distance the terracotta roofs break up the hillside green
shimmering like a toothy grin
in the midday sun
In the back seat, I watch as winding roads reach the sky
we stop only to palm a drink
from the freshwater springs
the mountains will wait eons for our eyes to gaze upon them
Burning eucalyptus fills
the air August fires,
stronger each day I
begin to dream in Portuguese
My father shifts gears
Jarring me awake
He turns back to me and says softly:
This is the heart of Portugal.
The Sun Shower
The sun came out
as the rain clung to the air
a bittersweet calm cascaded as the clouds parted
The opening filled the horizon
magpies warbled sun’s return
and I for one welcomed this change for it signaled in me a stirring
That my body no longer accepted its stationary position
a series of events that preordain movement
like a miller’s wheel
pushed along by the river’s current
Creating within it
an unstoppable creaking of cogs a call to action
a light
that complemented the weeping of the clouds and opened its beating heart towards me
And I, unaware of its power, became lifted by the rolling droplets and shifting lights
as white fire streamed from
a simple crack in the sky
Wild Dogs
I don’t pretend to be a dreamer but I can see its value from here
to long for a place of pure joy
like the quickened hooves of the water buffalo
Galloping endlessly towards their watering hole
the one they recognise
with its dusty plains and shallow basin
Where they have raised their calves
taught them the importance of strength in numbers
watched as the green collar
grew greener still around its edges
as the rains came to fill their refuge
All the while, the wild dogs circled waiting
feverish and hungry
As a dreamer often does waiting
to get to a place
they must commit to memory
float into its being
as they hum its chorus in their sleep
chest swelled and willing
All the while knowing out there
wild dogs wait
to pick them off
The Wood
There was a time
when I would spend hours upon hours
in the wood
Caked with different shades of yellowed leaves
Riverbeds inviting me to traverse into a space untouched
My blackened fingernails,
the smell of wet earth
Searching for the signs of life
A city underneath an upturned rock,
Fascinated by the resolve of these trivial creatures
Time stood still, as I reimagined countless tales with me as the protagonist
squelched patterns the only evidence of my stay
balancing on hollow logs
breathing clouds into the chilled afternoon
I often think about this transcendent world
tranquil and stoic
and hope one day to pass on the secrets of this mystic land to my children
so they too may spend countless hours
deciphering the hidden clockwork of the wood
The Shepherd’s Keep
Arms still waver from harvest’s work
bushels piled in endless rows
as I walk along the mountainside
clicking sheep following in tow
I amble back to the shepherd’s keep
the night draws in,
graceful and pink
resting now in front of the hearth
With supper balanced upon my weary knees
succumbing to the grasp of sleep
gaslight burned, flickering still
knowing the sunrise brings again
the enduring toil
And so I wake
and take my place
shy and beautiful
like a worker bee
I Haven’t Seen the Sun in Two Days
I wake again to eerie streets outside my windowpane
Opaque mists touch down to choke my view
As droplets hang in the air
I haven’t seen the sun in two days
craving its warmth upon my face
They say this is “God’s own country”
grey that bleeds from day to night
Though we all carry on through soaked coats
With steadfast conviction sunlight will return
Will the sky crack today?
Stoic in our regimen taking no notice
of the wet that lashes down
and feeds the pride of our countryside
