We fly away from that initial Bang,
and yet we cling together.  Gravity
pulls even protons into stellar gangs,
pressing them to fuse so brilliantly

they burn and light the sky for many eons,
waiting for their neighbors to explode
and spew abroad their heaviest accretions
to bond into a planetary lode.

And as the comets crash upon those worlds,
on some a sea may form and nurture life
which turns organic gases into swirls
of oxygen and compost – sugars rife –

that sink under the weight of other layers
until their fire is stored in fossil form
to wait until discovered by surveyors
who dig it up and burn it, trading harm

for profit, thus dispersing to the air
the carbon that our ancestors accreted,
now threatening to bake our planet bare.
At least H. sap. is soon to be deleted!

11 March 2023

Walking this trail beside the stream
among the ferns and evergreens
I smell the skunky stink of bog
and spice of rotting cedar log.
Familiarity’s embrace
makes this path a soothing place
but longing for discovery
of unknown vistas tugs at me.

There’s only so far I can hike,
so now I ride upon my bike
along this little winding strip
of broken asphalt to the ship
that waits to carry me away
to other shores and other days.
But still I yearn for greater scale,
impatient with the speed of sail.

And so I wait to board a plane
and fly above the clouds so fast
and far and high that I can gain
no knowledge of what trickles past
below me, or of how the place
I go connects to where I’ve been.
Will those who live there know my face
if someday I should come again?

(7 March 2023)

I can’t see you down there
living your life with all its
delicious triumphs and tragedies.
I am too high and moving too fast
and there are so many of you.
Next time maybe I’ll bike.

2023

To be in new places
with new people, new sights, new delights
is the only way to learn some things
that we need to know.
But to be there you have to go there
and eventually come back.
From this the lessons are never new.

2023