in the river

.
there is
the sea that draws me
from ground spring
and forest rain
to carry its life on leaf
and rippled song -- a notion
thought of going home
becomes an urge
compelling
ocean of heart
current in this river
there it is
the sea
.

New Straw

The other day, at my desk at work, for some reason I picked up a scent like none other so rich and comforting. It took me back to my boyhood on the farm. And this morning a golden glow out my morning window . . . In my journal I brought it together in verse:

New Straw

Late summer scent
New straw sweet
Cut and drying
Save morning due
The cooler nights
And now at first light
Reaching low over hills of gold
This glow and the harvest
Of my heart opening
Each new day
To love
.

I Walk

Discomfort with pen. The time almost up. It's been years since I haven't read my hour's creation. It's writers block in writers group. On Thursday night our group meets. Fresh writing for an hour, then reading. I wanted to capture the sense of peace in a forest walk. Too many false starts. But it is not to be. The flow of ink is stopped by a dull mind after long day. Resigned, I stop grasping for straws and I reach in another direction.

Then it begins . . .

I walk in the city, approaching Times Square from the direction of Madison Square Garden -- south, I believe. Hundreds of cars and cycles, taxis and trucks. Thousands of people. Black and white and colors of clothes. Suits and coats. Decked out in dress. And skinheads and dreds. Hats and backpacks on mothers-to-be.

The movement of masses. The people and traffic. Like a churning sea. The wave of human current does not wait for signal to flow, but crowds the street as a break in traffic allows. The tide forever rises and falls, not resting when gravity pulls by the cycles of earth and moon.

New York. Steel and stone. Pavement and people. Lights and song of everything industry. Culture and commerce. Theater and glow. Pulsing with arts in symphonic show. Vendor's display in windows and street. Rayon and silk. With mustard or sweet. Characters diverse. Derelict and divine. Beggars at church. Panhandle for wine. Bells and whistles and horns I hear. Cuisine, the finest. And pizza and beer.

Before I visited the city, I perceived it differently. A picture of life in fright from cramped quarters and crime. But in this walk I realize. It's all part of a much larger whole. Soul sees the higher view.

I walk toward Times Square. This too is life! And a new sense of invigoration. And control. Like I'm shooting the rapids. Or surfing the perfect storm. I am in the sea, but of the Love that gave all Life.

And at once -- a new setting. Serene. Overlooking the Pacific. On the north Oregon coast. The trail from the rain forest opens to the vista on a knoll of wind-bent coarse grass. And below -- a soft-sand beach. Unfurls in Light. The Sound. And forever -- the Sea.

I walk in peace within.

.

swing rhythm in oak

A friend told of a memory and her love of pastime in swing. I put the pictures it evoked into verse . . .

rings the sitter for the boys
walks down the street to the old church
white steeple, steep steps and trees
there's an ancient oak with arms
and a rope-slung seat
that calls her
the child
and dreamer
of Pegasian adventure
beyond the shade and stars

an hour sails past then two
the child six now grown
has flown years
by swing
always to ride
by the rhythm of life
till troubles of day
turn to waves
in the light
and sky

.

Barefoot and Naked

This one actually started as a sense of oneness with a usually-less-loved side of nature. I was barefoot in cut-offs and without shirt while picking raspberries. Then some nettles tuned my senses to its possibility of my discomfort. And a bee buzzed my head.

I long ago learned that bees and wasps do not attack without cause. Neither do nettles or thorny vines. And even an encounter with such elementals have purpose beyond pain. (Google bee sting therapy. Or stinging nettle therapy.) Fear is a worse affliction. Love is the antidote.

Barefoot and Naked
.
On the other side of comfort
there's a garden too
past blooms and roots
tomato red
mint scented
protected by elemental
thorn, thistle
and bumble bee.
.
As Soul I am free
don denim and leather
boot and sleeve
and long for adventure --
oh pillow and rocking chair.
.
Still barefoot and naked
on this side of me.
.

in soft velvet

.
smooth, round & purple
hiding in soft velvet leaves
first eggplant ripens
.

I Will

When I was much younger, I would banish the thought.
But as I advance toward an age of retirement,
I am glad to release some of the
past importance.
Plot is so much more intricate and character fine.
What youth may not even notice
is a world of adventure, exploration
and insight.

When I am old
I will remember
the glee and song.

When I am old and wise
I will remember
the lesson of questions and sky.

When I am old and wise with white hair
I will remember
my youth and the color and the hearing
if I remember.

.

My Window

It could be the first light announced by robins at dawn. Or the arbor still black in silhouette. A squirrel or neighbor's tom. Or semi versus motorcycle in distant freeway traffic. From my window I see and hear. I go there by love seat and journal. Come with me if you like.

Today in the rain
a deer looked my way
from the tree line 50 yards off.
I raised the paper in my hand
and waved to her.
White flag of peace.
Ears perk and gaze more alert
She looked south
before her fawn
came bounding closer
Then both were off
to the safety of a thicket.

In the forest
what color is
the flag of peace?

Earlier . . .

Still before storm,
and Starlings gather.
Elm and oak are occupied.
Talk in the alder is of earth and sky.
Why do we bother with thoughts of loss?
Clouds roll up into thunder heads.
And peppers ripen.

Yesterday, lifting the morning blinds to a new day, they greeted me again. A pair of crows. So often they show up as my muse and inspiration.

Two crows of consciousness
sitting on a fence
One flies right and one leaps left.
Black as a feather,
blue as the sky
While they are living,
They'll never die?

.

A New Glade

.

There! The sun shines on the green wall.

Wall of the forest facade.

I see just the first bank of trees

In leaf, showy and bright.

But vision is not just of this.

Penetrating. I see.

I’ve been there before,

Beyond the facade.

I’ve walked through the layer of bright-lit green.

I’ve walked through the light.

Away from song and dance of everyday.

Into the past. The future.

And into the silence of now.

Even the rustle and twitching of unseen events

Adds to the silence of a softer hue.

Sings of a cool summer shade

And touches the glade of memory:

Your first breath in my ear.

The word before I knew

Your name.

.

I walk. I sit.

I dream and fly.

And we are together.

Beyond the facade and the song.

Till the sun’s angle changes everything.

And there is but one peace.

And love.

.

Blessings

This morning I did more than look out the window. I took a cushion, a book and my journal out the door. An old, twig rocker in the shade invited me. Then, in a sense, I went "out of my mind" in Thanksgiving. Perfect Morning. Summer holiday. Family & friends still sleep. And the cat on the couch. Inside.
But I. In the world of my senses -- inner and outer. My Garden. Birdsong and Breeze. Out of my mind. Inspired. I contemplate. And write. . .

Blessings

My Love.
First there was Life.
Then you are in my Garden.
Planting. Cultivating. The Harvest.
How could life be better than this?
Where Life Serves Me?
And I Serve It?
With You?

And in the heat of the day
We stop and rest.
With Strawberries.
Red and Sweet.

Then a gray squirrel
Brings an acorn.
And Blessings.

.

Claiming Dreams

Through my morning window I observed motion on the tree across the street. Three squirrels. My first thought was 'Haiku.' But it is the 4th of July, Independence Day in the US. I start to grasp the net that ties it all together . . .

Claiming Dreams

New maple domain
Early sun broadsides gray trunk
Young squirrels play three.

All is right across the lot
Yet others say, It's too late
To celebrate this day
Independence Day
Freedom from oppression
Claiming our destiny.

In my dreams
I can do whatever I want
A rock becomes a leaf
A leaf -- a bird
And I become a squirrel
To claim my domain.

Hey wait a minute!
We can all dream.

Why wouldn't our dreams
Out-vote the nightmare
Of fear and despair?
Of terror and poverty
And global disaster?
Which do we choose?

Good Morning, World!
Wake up!
Claim your domain.
It starts with a dream.

.

Airshow

Every Father's Day there is an airshow somewhere close. Like a lot of men I love aviation, but I chose not to go. I garden instead.

Airshow

Pulling pigweed from potato hills
and watering strawberry row,
I hear a warbird roar.
No. Two in formation fly by,
and off in a distant drone.
Blue sky through trees,
and white clouds,
like smoke on horizon.
My attention is drawn up
and northward. Reaching.
I remember another life...
Was it Nam? or France?
Or a movie clip
that moves my soul.
I go there for seconds.
Maybe minutes like the first.
Then a bluejay lands in the maple.
And another. Excited. Ready.
Like dads at an airshow.
I watch -- and they're off
in a dive, a bank and a roll.
Dad at an airshow
as I take my hoe.
Delighted again
in reflection.
.

Contrast in Morning Song

.
Traffic with its accent
and backbone of motorcycle monotone
lingers from window to wane.
           A robin in contrast to city.
           give me forest and glen
           and the silent side of Mt. Rushmore
           is real life teeming.
I breathe in this solace of Life and Sound.
Dreaming of true song
and patter.
.

Interlude

So much in every moment . . .

Interlude

Crow calls
and a black crow
lights on a wire beside it.

           We watch the morning garden
           in its light and life.

Till the next call. And off.
A second. An interlude.
A crow.

.

Morning Light

I love this time of day!!

***

Morning Light

Every morning
earth's first breath is a blessing in Light
rolling uninterrupted
through infinite possibility.
As we synchronize our Breath
with each other's
we know this love:
Reflective. Translucent.
And Live.
And when night falls here
millions of mornings are re-lit.
It hasn't stopped yet.
So we soak our oats and know more grow
till the Harvest is brought in
by Summer's Light.

.

Crossing the Tracks

--A short short story conceived in a few seconds on a drive back from Greek food at the Athens Cafe. Just by the gait and stride of a young mother in an evening walk, it unfolded...

Crossing the Tracks
by Ardi Keim

Left at the church on the corner. Past the playground of the school of The Holy Family. Recalling the laughter, shrill screams of girls and the most important demands of boys, while two teachers watch half-attentively in their conversation at the edge of the blacktopped confine. Will Robbie be there one day, demanding fairness his way? Another girl shrieks the ending quote of that cyclone fenced memory.

What is freedom?, she wonders now, and every time she passes the school yard--kids or no kids. When she was one of the shrieking girls there, her dreams didn't go much beyond the moment and the fence. But now, approaching the railroad crossing at the dog-leg bend of Orchard Street, she reflected on later thoughts. Was it the spider on the signal box that retreated around the edge as she got closer in this late spring evening? Still a chill in the air, but the sun's angle on the silver-painted metal box reflected the glare of a hot summer day. Though last week she brought the snow shovel from the porch to storage, now she looks southeast down the tracks to another world in August.

She and two girlfriends on one of their adventures mothers never know, in the year before she met Dale. Wild then -- and free. Her only job was assistant to the activity director at summer camp in Wisconsin. She couldn't wait to be out on her own then. Her own car and a good job. There were tracks past camp too--parallel to county road 121. She remembered the rumble in the evening after dinner in down-time on her bunk, or walking by the lake. And once her granddad told her and Tom some stories of his early days on the rails, riding the cars to Spokane and Portland, and once to a place called Lafayette down south somewhere. Adventure and Freedom! And summer day dreams. She could see forever down the tracks. Tom joined the Marines last year. His life seems exciting, even still in training. He says he might go to Pakistan in the fall.

Bump. Bump. The wheels of the stroller hobble across the second track. And her last look southeast, as she re-enters her neighborhood and the realization returns. Dale, Robbie and the news from the doctor earlier today.
.
(c) 2008 Ardi Keim
.

Imagination Day: Spring At Last

This day –

so far away from last month’s

last chance at winter

in its fits of tightening

and releasing its grip.

Finally, I relax. I soak. I see.

I hear the life in vibration of each pleasing bee

and ant—buzzing, crawling

—climbing to the heights of sky and tree.

.

How do they know?

Is it by memory or deduction?

Or is it by pure imagination

conceived on the dreams of ancient ancestors

and last year’s hive?

The colony survives by these dreams

and written in rote,

not even known till green leaves to light

the way through season.

.

I see the spectrum of new leaves emerging,

At first pale and cheerful in this becoming – and lacy.

Seems almost tentative in their approach.

But even without memory they invade

with the full force of summer color.

Bright and bold, jade and olive

and always multiplying

to fill each tree and yard and forest

in logarithmic advance to their natural abundance.

.

There is no lack in life and love.

In each twig and bud and leaf is the belief in the Divine.

And not by deduction, but by doing

the deed of each instant and dancing

to the song of now.

.

I too imagine,

my becoming is new

in the true sense of Spring.

How could it be any different

than each step and each breath

advancing, proceeding from previous green?

.

I am an ant on a bud, and the world is mine.

Sweet nectar. And Blessings

of Light and Love.

.

Good Tea

She was due home last night, but got bumped in Boston. (Phoenix, really. But I write by license of poetic dreaming.) So one more night. I wait. . . and awake this morning with this most natural thought. (Or was it "the man-on-the-spot"?) :

Good Tea

Good sleepy time teacups together.
Retire relaxed and intending,
but passing the chance
of one kind of bliss
when heads hit their pillows
they're off in a wisp to white willows
and sun of the sandy white shores
where warm breezes easy
asleep in their peace
of good sleepy tea
and dreaming
together
as one.

Both in their slumber
under the quilt of their drifting
blissful in journey somewhere
until chill of cool morning air
draws across errant hair
tickling brow or cheek.
Now from her sleep
still half in a dream
that's quite pleasing,
and hand in that natural spot.
Enjoying no care and pleasant the thought
of the one that's beside her still gliding
out in white clouds of somewhere.
Oh, could it be here at the spot?
And would this one dream
care to catch two?

She reaches across
to a world still receding
and finding the hand of her man
at the most natural spot in support.
Attention! Good Morning.
Good sleepy time treat.
Now awake by intent
or delay of effect.
What matters
comes naturally.
Yet question--priority:
Do we roll for the rocking?
Or first shall we pee?
Good morning.
Good sleepy.
Good tea.

Would Celestial Seasonings have it any other way?
;)
.

Love the Feast

What is love, but an honoring of God in everyone?

Can it be for just one without being for all?

You and You, and It and Me

in a tree and on a hill.

We tell the same story

in connection with Source.

We are of a sacred station.

Not tethered in stanchion by thought,

unless we think a lot in circles

and forget who we are.

Are we worthy of a feast?

Reason only takes us so far.

And we’ve all been further than that.

There are seeds in my apple,

orchards in my future with pie

and cinnamon's right

contribution.

Love the feast

we are.

Pink Bow

Spring forth green earth.

Lighten the mood with white buds and laughter.

What was last month, but a fading memory?

Dark clouds no longer shade my days,

but portend a rain of blessings.

Spruce from its laden posture

now lifts in anticipation

of each solar event.

Days of the quickening

lace limber saplings with Forsythia.

Pink is soon to join the daffodils by tulip,

blossom of apple wood,

prunus avium,

and a bow on your jumper.

Me too! Let’s go.

Spring forth in this love.

I remember our first kiss.

Was Spring in a fever.

Your jumper and pink bow.

So free, the memory.

And you in your laughter.

Oh yeah, the reliving

in every Spring.