where the red dragonfly silently hangs over on a reed
preying the mindless mosquito,
and the stiletto gray cat waits underneath, still as death,
slitting her eyes at the silliness of blue jays...
the birdbath quietly holds its small dark mirror.

the dramas of a hundred toad lilies 

have been told and told and blown and bled out,
the sweet freckled blooms long since
cremated in the texas heat.
dust to dust.
all of it lies dirt still.

until dinner is served.
a suddenness of jaws and
tiny beaky screams
strikes a jagged edge to garden life
that even lightning could admire.

nothing compares to the local preds
with murder on their minds.

it's the best i can do. tell you stories
about what goes on in the garden.
in 99 years you've pored over that bible
until there's no good plot left to discover.
and the stuff that goes on outside the window
is still cracking new with possibilities
if i peer at it
with dragonfly detail
through half-closed cat's eyes.

i can do that
for you.

redwood

there is no pretense about 2000 year old trees.

they are what they are.

and they are magnificent. sacred. 

a presence beyond any words to dignify.

it burns a hole in me that only four percent 

of the original coastal groves of these giants remain.

four. percent. of perhaps the largest trees on earth. 

all the rest were cut down. 

all.

what is it about us that condemns greatness

and draws a crowd to watch it fall? 

our bland, middle class american 

stumbling around

wearies him.

he is so healthy, at 70 something,

and weary of his island life,

the years he drove the school bus,

and now the fund raisers for the library,

playing a clumsy lewis carroll 

to two rounds of applause

and a goofy jacob marley

delighting the kids.

he's tired of all that.

he wants monasticism and a woman in thrall.

he loves rachmaninoff and caol isla

finds great beauty in derelict merchants

hawking the boardwalk.

he rails at a gagged culture

that fails to nurture our nascent inner sweetness.

he doesn't see that he has it all.

doesn't know how to revel 

in the bounty of his own goodness,

the culture of his own soul.

the only culture we've got.

we don't just live out there.

we live in here, out there.