Widdershins

Hide and seek
Played with faiths,
Bedfull of rain,
Tales of the temporal
And the sudden,
Specific
Starts and stops.
Only traitors
Pray for destruction
Of their own.

Too much purpose
Ignores the fevered.
So easy to forget,
2 degrees seems
So little.
And I think you might
Be confused
About what chosen
Means.

Will it be these?
Monarch and tiger swallowtail
Beckon on.
Leaning trees
By the unbuilt
Vernal pools,
Waiting for rain.
Remember the ducks?
The redbellies?
They gathered here
Late in winter.

And everything moves.
And everything trembles
And shakes with it.
It’s down here
Deep in the wildway.
Here.
But it’s hard to carry.

Throwing bones –
Listen!
Fool and Tower –
Listen!
Hawk and hummingbird –
Listen!
Engines endless –
Listen!

Impossible signs,
Symbols all around.
We cannot be saved.
And I know
I am just one
Small, scared girl
With holes in the soles
Of my shoes,
And admittedly
Not ready
To close my last eye,
But on my knees,
I am asking.

The answers are
Whispers,
Lost in noise.
Going back now
To the meadow
Where the goldenrod
Prepares to burst,
I am salting the earth,
Sweat and tears.
Here in her holy
Temple,
Cast these bones,
Words,
Walk back to seal it,
A prayer
For the unexpected.