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Précis for Aurora

(x = space)

x

x

Précis for Aurora

x

It’s winter

And it’s likable

Because

It’s cold outside

But there isn’t snow

Or ice or slush

Or such upon

The ground;

My car is clear

Should I need it,

And the sun is rising

Making the branches

Look like

Black arms with points

Reaching out,

Beseeching something

And I’m sorry

But I don’t know what

x

What does nature need

But to exist

And have oxygen and room

For existence

And some growth?

We could help

Or get in the way;

We conquer nature

So we think

To have our grand

Plans realized

For things above,

Below

The water table

Or some other

Primordial impediment

x

Do we cooperate

I wonder,

Ever:

Do we like our trees

And clouds

And ground and stones

And deeper things

Or

Are they only things

In the way?

x

We have a dominion

Theory,

Saying that

We are in charge

Of all of it

The flora and the fauna

And everything

That doesn’t move

Until cracks in the ground

Or volcanos

Dictate; I’m not sure

How our commission goes

Should we be

Evaluated—what kind

Of grade would

Watching angels

Grant us?

x

I say all this

Because it’s early

And the trees along

The street

Must manage with

Vehicular traffic;

The cars and trucks

Are noisy

While the trees

Are quiet (no wind

to show a

protest, either)

x

I wish you well today

And us

Us together,

Since the CO-2 and

O-2 arrangement

Keeps us going

And we are ruining

The Amazon

And I don’t know

How we’re doing

On Main Street

x

C L Couch

x

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Photo by Renting C on Unsplash

x

(I actually do live on Main Street; maybe you do, too)

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2

They Wave Farewell

(x = space)

x

x

They Wave Farewell

(Memorial Day, USA)

x

Red

(with white and blue)

Waving over fields

Dropping morning dew

x

For us

It is remembering

A waving day of it

Poppy remembering

x

Nature teaches

And must be

A burying place for war

The fields wave

The children wave

We wave

They wave farewell

x

Nature weeps

With dew, with rain, with

Anything that falls

All of us may fall

And weep

We may weep

For the children

(all are children)

Of the world

x

C L Couch

x

x

Photo by Wolfgang Hasselmann on Unsplash

x

4

Paradise Neither Lost nor Found

(x = space)

x

x

Paradise Neither Lost nor Found

x

It is not the best of times

Just now

I have to own that part

Of the Dickens

Narration

Too many sick

I know

And there is war

Infamous

Famously defended

I’d like to know the wisdom

Of the ages

Those who contemplated

Long ago

How to redeem the mind

And sanctify the heart

How did they do it

When we’re so

Smarter now

x

How may I call up

Desert mothers

Desert fathers

My might I stir

My own kind of Celtic blood

That came to northern shores

And tried to have companionship

With nature and each other

Until organized, metallic

Factions entered

And took over

Slew what did not submit

Killed what submitted

Anyway

x

That’s my northernness

I guess

I guess I like it well enough

I’d like to know yours

And what you have from the

Southern half

Because you might

Have that

East or west

As interesting

Exciting

The fascination of our differences

Shared in easy friendship

Easy joy

The direction points aren’t bad

Unless you make them

Points of dominion

Or points of fear

x

Fear not

We can come toward each other with

Fingertip excitement

Passing through time

And sentiment

To share a call that says

The Earth is one

We are one

We are one and one and one

And one

x

C L Couch

x

If she doesn’t mind, I’d like to dedicate this work to Judith Nilan who wrote so kindly of me recently and whose friendship is cherished by me and by anyone else who is her friend, I’m sure.  You should read her blog because it would be good for you.  Her blog address is https://stonefireblog.com/.

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Photo by Solen Feyissa on Unsplash

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2

Anjali Mudra

(x = space)

x

x

Anjali Mudra

x

What does love say

On this or any other

Plain day?

The sun is out for now

Dust is settled

Here and there

Some of the folds

In the blankets have been

Smoothed out

It is a lonely day,

And that’s all right

Not as a concession

But as a source

For small peace

That could be broken

Should the phone

Be lifted

And knowing that,

There is no desperation

A quiet day

An ordinary day

A day between the holidays

As most of our days are

x

Nothing to own

Gifted

Are the seconds and

The minutes, the hours

And the dust

Our scant possessions

No matter how tall

Or deep

They can’t defeat

The mountains

Or the trenches of the deep

We can coexist

There is no point

In conquest

When nature rolls everything

At last

Into the waiting ground

x

Fight it

Or have

A knowing peace

x

C L Couch

x

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Photo by Levi Meir Clancy on Unsplash

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0

Earthwise

Earthwise

 

God, it seems

You’re quiet

While outside there’s noise

The promise of a storm

 

You could be speaking through

The storm, I guess

I’ve never known you that way

Though there are limits

On my listening

 

Maybe if I were shaman-wise

I’d understand your language

In the trees

And through the rain

And if the thunder means

You’re angry or

You’re sad or making declarations

Or nothing of the sort

Since I’m sure

The flowers speak as well

As all things

On their own

 

You split the sky

The earth rises

Smaller creatures scurry

They know where

 

We’re here, and

We don’t understand

All that would be given

If we didn’t try

To take it first

 

God, this is

A prayer

For peace among ourselves

So we might get

The message sent

That everything and

Everyone has voice

Especially the quiet

 

And with our senses

And with more

We might receive the word

That starts

The universe

And also

Brings us home together

 

C L Couch

 

 

Photo by Glenna Hopper on Unsplash

Isle of Sky

 

8

And Can It Be

And Can It Be

 

And can it be

That on a day when the sun

Shines somewhere behind clouds

Basking indifferently above horizons

That the industrious

And inventive

Will find a way

So that, as she says,

All shall be well

 

The hazelnut she sees as the world

Will crack, the softness inside

Exuding into earth

To make the world anew

Two parts come together, then

 

Nature and ourselves

Nature and nature

We could be allies

We could protect each other

Let air

And ground,

Let blue and green,

Let wildness and cultivation be

 

Admit mistakes on all affected sides

Find solutions that

Don’t kill but use the planet well,

First things first

But never only

I wish it could be a simple song

But the harmony must be

Complex,

Composition worked out carefully

Remembering to consult

With the conductor

 

It is a vision

That can happen

She saw this

The touchstones matter

We can find our own

Use our words

Apply our talents well

So that all, as she ways,

Shall be well

 

And can it be

A healthy alliance with the cosmos

And productive

I believe you know

It must be

 

C L Couch

 

 

Image by LoggaWiggler from Pixabay

 

3

The Best Is Yet to Come

The Best Is Yet to Come

 

The best is yet to come and, babe, won’t it be fine?

 

Dancing, crooning

Love songs

Ties and gowns or overalls and pinafores,

Doesn’t matter

There is glitter in the air

The lights of romance

There’s music from a combo

Ain’t it all fine?

 

There has to be more of this

Not an increase

Or exaggeration

But ongoing

The laughing, dancing, crooning combo

Always at hand

To have and have again

Not a party without end

But reasons to

Celebrate that last

 

The kind of work

(exertion of energy)

That heals

The smiles from musicians, which

Can say

We are free at last

And we love you

And an audience

In equal measure grateful

Taking part

Tomorrow there will be other things

And there will be tomorrow

For now,

There’s confidence

In this place of music

Fancy lights

(not the kind that blind)

Hands clasping on the dancing floor

 

Maybe we’ll go outside

Not because nature is tame

But because

It tames us

With its own lights of night

And gift of rock

For a dancing floor

 

This is a vision

Of necessity

Because the flesh that hears,

Touches, and responds

Should go on in some way

Call it paradise

The life renewed

That hasn’t lost a note or a step

 

C L Couch

 

 

“The Best Is Yet to Come”

written by Cy Coleman and Carolyn Leigh

Frank Sinatra and Count Basie performed and recorded for the album It Might as Well Be Swing (1964) and performed and recorded by many others.

 

photo by Manuel Inglez on Unsplash

Parque Natural de Sintra-Cascais, Sintra, Portugal

 

8

More

More

 

There’s something more

It’s here

Inside the pale blue

Between the yellow light

And the branch’s skin

There is green, too,

Dark in the shadow

 

We can make it human

I suppose we always do

But there is another planet here,

A world whose talk

Is in the leaves

Whose senses know the light

And every color

Every texture,

Each thing that moves so that

Another thing might live—

It’s all cooperation

 

Learn from this

Don’t make it human yet;

It’s intimate already

It’s conscious because energy

Has wisdom

And gravity a story

 

The tree is a tale that moves

And also waits

So much to tell

More so than mute artifice

We should know this

And as we don’t

 

So wait!

All things are here

Enough for life, because it’s life

A history if

We could pull the sunbeams from the

Earth to read

We can’t for now

 

So listen, please

With all concrete senses

Best that we can do—

Please, listen

To the story that could save us

Every day,

If we don’t destroy

The binding and

The pages

Let ink run as blood from entropy,

Our self-made ruin

Of whole things,

Run into empty land

And lifeless water

 

Reclaimed by

An angry universe

Having expected

So much more

With all that had been given

Every word in nature

 

No wonder why

The angel kept, outside

Of paradise,

A flaming sword

Pressed by what’s inside

Ignited by protection of what’s true,

True stories, more

Than what we wrote

And what we wrote that we forget

 

Still having a last chance to hear

To receive

If only by the gateway,

A last chance to learn

 

C L Couch

 

 

Photo by Erico Marcelino on Unsplash

The Wanaka Tree, New Zealand

 

7

For Those Dying Last Night

For Those Dying Last Night

 

 

I can wonder

How many died overnight

And I do:

From fires, murder—way too many guns out there

To make it easy

Earthquake without preparation

Before catastrophe is imminent

Volcanic flooding and

The killing funnel winds and so much more

 

Death from lack of funding

Lack of food

Water without sickness caused in

Drinking as we have to do

Death from addiction

Let’s pass fault like drawing fault lines

All around

 

It’s the death unnecessary

That is maddening

As in angering

And thinking that our planet’s people

We are insane

For valuing a life over the next

For execution

Or reward

And a temporal plutarchy

(as in for the moment)

Abrogates decisions from the rest

From the most

The vast most

Of us

 

Blame nature, if you will

It is so strong

But at worst indifferent

With signs drawn almost in miracle

That it would just as soon

Lavish Earth with green and blue

Morning mist of romance

Evenings of wind-song

If only we’d stop destroying all the sense

All the delight

Even the magic in

Everything we should know

Do better

 

No, frog—isn’t easy being green

When your world wants to wither you

In fact, find new places to do so

And turn a profit in the air

Made black before nightfall

And there’s a prophecy

 

We keep living to hate nature

It will find a way to act and show

It hates us back

 

 

addendum

 

Was it taming nature?

Or negotiating,

Beseeching it not to break

Our dams or roads

Or anything for which

We lay foundation?

Did we not ask for mercy

When we lay the track

And dredge the harbor

Back from where

It had newly settled from

Whose effort, I wonder?

Do we not beg the

Earth as we split it with our

Dredges, channeled water

Wide, fractured slate

Not to hate us but

To give us our reward?

Have we ever sought to understand

Balance, agree with

How it sets and how it turns

And how we might live well

With it?

If so, then

That’s the song to sing

 

 

C L Couch

 

 

 

Photo by Marc Szeglat on Unsplash

Hawaii, United States

Lava from Kilauea on Hawaii flows into the ocean. I shot this picture in October 2017. More on my website volcanoes.de.

 

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