Northern Lights

Take me away
sturdy rowboat
the midnight sky is deep and clear
over this Great Lake
and no Earthly map steers our course.
With every pull and plash of the oars
the lights on shore blink and dim
and finally in deep water
we rest in the company of steady stars.

From the north
with no warning
a strange visitor appears
wrapped in whirls of color
his flare flashes
the sky
and with nimble fingers plucking harp strings
shimmering
composes a symphony of light.

How many minutes
or hours
during this late-night performance
improvised across the sky
we drift and float
rocking in the
rhythm of fluid rainbows
awash in the wonder of it
bathed in the aesthetics
I do not know
yet gradually
like a shy performer quietly slipping out the stage door
the Northern Lights vanish
into the fixed reality of the constellations
and by the stars again
we find our way home.

Messages

there’s no reason
not to write
except for the inertia of
finding a working pen
and a blank sheet of
paper in this hectic day
of doing the same of more nothing
to answer the lovely Christmas card
with pictures of your family and letter
sent
and here it’s nearly Valentine’s Day
thinking of love and that
candy bought
years ago
the wrong kind
not eaten
oh where the hell is my pen?

Artist’s Tools

Sketched in winter’s black charcoal
the trees ache for the brush of
spring’s watercolors.