Patterning
The ocean loves the land and wants it back,
a fevered longing to possess since time
began the forces pushing them apart.
Out here, along the western margins north,
when autumn sends the poking tourists home,
the winter winds engage,
and water starts to swell and push
against the ramparts of the coast.
By mid-November, gales abet the sea's desire,
and thrash the wave-crest spume
along the breaking surf where storms
stride in from continental shelf to rouse
a moon-mad tidal impulse up, and thrust it grey and wild,
on reef and boulder, churning in,
all blue-green foamy to the inner shoreline pools,
while over all, the urgent west wind shrieks
delight through hemlock thickets,
bending in a mute compliance
to the forces pounding in.
Now all along these ragged western shores,
the ocean throws itself in frenzied water,
wrack and tumbling logs
against and up and over sand or rock to mark
its yearly conquest in a heavy-throated tumult of debris.
And past the breakers, inland, where the water comes
as mist or curtains, sheets of heavy rain,
the veiling moisture driven, soaks
the garment moss the modest forest wears.
Just here, the spent seas and the swollen rivers meet,
and tide and current silently contend.
Only beneath and surging through,
a flood of thrashing fins
exhausts its desperate upstream way
in salmon homing on their natal stream to spawn.
So fertile land absorbs the fertile sea, and lets
the gift enrich and nourish other life.
Gulls, eagles, clumsy bears engorge on dying fish,
and even crawling slugs upon the slime
or chittering birds in undergrowth grow fat,
ingesting some part of the ocean's distant power,
which now upon those far shores wanes,
as gentler tides draw back, to leave
their tracery in such delicate caress
so etched upon the timeless sand
as might some lover leaving patterned silk
upon the breasts of his beloved.
Cascadia at Englishman River Falls
As we descend this ordered, parkland trail
within this modest, regulated woods,
secure your attitude discreetly
and observe:
Just here, the trailhead pauses for the view
of glistening sheets of water held
in check by rocky, fern-draped banks
before it gently slides
across the mossy stones,
evoking murmurs,
liquid trills and chuckling gurgles,
gathering force
to start the plunge beyond
control, down deep
to darkened grooves
of polished granite thighs,
in clefts that trap,
direct the flood
of pulsing thunder,
gushing, foaming on
upthrusting glistening nubs,
engorging on
a shower of needles seeded
from great rampart,
trunks of fir trees hanging
hungry o´er the gorge
to rain upon the turbulence
cascading under them,
to vent ecstatic energy
in downstream spasms
over incidental fondlings
of more incidental stones
and gravelly ramblings where
the spent foam clings
to mossy banks that clothe
the lower river reaches
in a frothy after-wash
of murmuring content.
September on the Trans-Canada
The great deciduous forest now
begins its month-long
transformation
from impassive greens
to some sporadic hints of orange,
then a blushing crimson all
along its highway front
where only conifers remain aloof,
pretending not to notice
this outrageous fall fandango
in their midst;
but then,
the odd outstanding
scarlet hussy drops
her summer dress
entire, to stand,
dry remnants rustling at her feet,
enticing winter’s early winds:
“Come play me wild
and whip my long, bare limbs
against the harvest sky,
before I snuggle white, to sleep
your longest nights away.”
Raccoon at Dawn
Raccoon!
Munch me.
In firelight, hunched across my food.
Hold me up to glittering want
And crunch into my shell;
Lip-licking wholly, take me in.
Now, fire!
Sweep up me
Hungry to digest,
And let my heartwood feel the consummation
Of your need.
So take me into embers
Glowing
In the after-ache of passion.
And dawn!
Flow down my western hills;
Through fir and floating alder
Touch the image
Smudged across the lake,
Of where I stand
Amazed across the coals
To meet the timid brittleness
Of raccoon-furtive teeth
Upon my own mortality.