POETRY AND ART

Thank you, Yorkville Public Library, for the Poetry and Art event today.

And a special shout out to my new talented friend, Tracy Snicker, for the art she created, inspired by the poem I wrote entitled "Bundled."

(Masks removed for photo only)









Bundled
Fifty steps into this thicket
I sift through the thick of it.
I am layered and lined,
coated and proofed,
booted and bundled,
fleeced and sure-footed
in all I’ve purchased
to protect from whatever
I am called to weather.
Yet I do not grieve the fallen leaves
cushioning my steps,
veined and wedged
between earth and foot.
I envy the flesh-colored pillows
their naked demise,
their release from the bough,
their twirling death-spin
as they drift
and settle
and mingle
under the mighty branches,
a down shroud between the quickening cold
and the soil where seeds slumber.
They do not bind to branches.
They do not long to be pressed between pages.
They are left, far from bereft.
I am a walker of the woods,
a preserver of prose,
as if words will never wither when
we are without breath and buried
beneath this dusty trail.
Such simple flesh-colored drifters,
bundled and born to turn tattered,
aren’t we merely threads in the thickest of blankets
made to be worn?

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