The Masked Woman

The  Masked Woman

 

I remember the first time

I saw you sitting inside a tire

Swinging under a tree

Like a happy child

Your eyes were fixed on me

Like a bee chasing my thoughts.

I was memorizing the afternoon

Poetry of a pandemic.

Old Age

Where will they hide, the feral cats?

Cranes have ancient places to migrate to

With years added to years one thinks

Of these things like pointed pursuits.

 

One idea takes hold of another idea

Like rising pitch of a siren hurrying to a destination

Cranes know where to go

And where to return.

 

Dreams can be deep in the subconscious

Will functional imaging know?

Subconscious messages wanting explanations

Who will quote them?

 

Somewhere new light is emerging

The eagerness is hard to stop

Shortening years do not dwell on losses

Not in darkness but in new striving.

 

Life is to be mastered and celebrated

Life can be full to the end.

 

Sublime

Can I see it or feel it?

Above simplicity?

I walk to the river

The part of the world opens

Other walkers walk alone

Or with their dogs or with other walkers

Nature greets us in songs and colorful displays

Do we need measurements

And ask : Will experience be sublime?

Little Things To Fill A Heart

Watching the fishermen:

the boys and their mother

catch 3 fish in one afternoon 

within a space of 30 minutes

is enough to fill my heart.

 

I continue my walk,

a kayaker paddles his way in the river

another, older fisherman hides under a shade

and a fellow walker resting on a bench

while 3 ducks are inching their places on a concrete ground

I wave goodbye to a lone bird on top of electric wires.

 

I’m walking home.

 

 

Under a tree

Under a tree

A young boy returning from a walk to the river

Stops under a tree, glances at its little shade

Pulls from one of his pockets an orange

Starts peeling, dropping the peelings on the ground

Cuts a slice and puts it in his mouth.

Smiles, then resumes his walk.

 

I continue my walk towards the river.

Wabi-sabi

A Palm Tree Blooms.

Accumulation of solitudes, tumult of the heart diminishes 

until it’s just a whisper, light as a leaf

You have been longing 

to know your real self

During your walk

or when alone in the river

You feel your deep affinity with nature

with other creatures

Alone with the blue heron

or with other traveler

Pandemic awakens your consciousness,

shakens by injustice.

Beware when all the running stops

numbness sets in and silence.

Out of weariness and withered trees 

love will rise.

 

 

Questions

We talked for hours

We compared our separate memories:

notebooks, cupcakes, candlelight dinners

Coming out at night after we ran out of dreams

Our arms were still empty

and waiting

like two anglers standing on a river bank

reviewing the science of angling,

studying the river landscape

Where are the insects?

the shadows, the deep hiding places

silence of pride and pleasure.

Imagine if life is timeless.

They pause for lunch.

Do the fish miss also the fisherman?