Praise: For the Earth

In the quiet places,

or even among crowds,

when the slant of light

raises eyes toward the horizon,

something in us watches

for promptings from earth, for beckonings

from sinewed limbs of old trees

that pull us rootward

into the archives of being here.

Light breathes through leaves

better than the finest stained glass,

flowers color themselves so deeply

one expects the hues at a touch

to leave a rich talc of reds and yellows

indelible on fingertips.

Halos open and spread toward us

in lakes and slow rivers,

ovations from pebble, insect, fish.

Water - cool and clean -

is still the best quenching,

gold dust on the hills at dusk

the most soothing of lights.

And even in the quietest dawn,

the tented woods try to make us ready,

to bring us to heed,

to bring us to enter

the tremble of aspen

at first light.