Tree is Watching...
—Photo by Katy Brown, Davis
FAITH
—D.R. Wagner, Elk Grove
Just before I woke up I
saw three men
Sewing the edges of what
seemed to be
A dream. I was going to ask them if that
Was what they were doing
but the light
Suddenly shifted and I was
back standing
On the edge of the same
pile of rocks
That seemed to be leaning
out over the town.
I thought I would walk
down to the spring,
Get some water. But I did not know where
Any spring was located and
my head was
Beginning to fill with all
sorts of ideas that
People had mentioned to me
if I ever found
Myself out in a place like
this. The ropes
Holding the day up were
beginning to haul
The whole thing down. The barns were losing
Their red to a deafening
gray. I knew I would
Need a light of some kind
very soon.
When I got to the the first
of the great oaks
I saw lights flickering in
the lower reaches
Of the trees, where they
bent to touch the earth.
This was how things were
supposed to look,
I told myself. Even sound had an aura about it.
It was as if faith in life
and in the beautiful,
In friendship, and
kindness and love and all
Those things I had been
told when I was young
Could really be true here
on earth. That was
When I knew I was
dreaming. Someone
Pulling on the sleeve of
my coat, hungry,
Afraid to ask for anything
more than a mouthful
Of food, not even a lousy
cigarette, or a piece
Of hard candy might be
asking too much and
They were not going to get
it from anyone in
This bloody country. It was a mother, somebody’s
Mother, but she too was
pulled back into the night.
I reached my horse just at
the edge of the long
Meadow. I felt I might be able to come back, to
see places
Like this again. To know there was a place where
Love would go better than
listening to a head filled
With the noises of hurt
and want. I love you, the
Great oaks whispered to no
one in particular.
How about that?…to no one
in particular.
_______________
—Medusa
