THE 3AM STARS

THE 3AM STARS

3 a.m. stars were holding

brightly tight to their dome

as desert chill challenged three

watchers alarmed from bed.

The Big Dipper’s handle

had fallen straight down,

but upness was everywhere

and never all to be taken in.

Earthbound, we flashlit our

paths around backyard cacti

while overhead, quick meteors

like flaming needles pierced

and sewed at the night.

Several arrived each minute

but seldom did any two

claim the same piece of sky.

Some blazed up so bright

they lit up the desert floor—

doubt but believe.

We embodied three generations,

we watchers who stood or sat

or reclined on a blanket.

Endless depth boggled our eyes

yet we little asked and less knew

why we were alive just then.

Boy, father, grandfather were we.

What all might have happened

or not happened in our three lives

to cause any of us to be absent?

We had beaten unmathematical odds

to meet for this familial, communal

sky harvest, as had the listening lizards

who heard our “Hey!” and “Whoa!”

and “Did you see that one?”

And how better to bond

than under a needled infinity?

JUST ASKING

Just Asking

I ask how eyes know when to wake

and lovers, when to love,

how engines feel when pulling trains,

why planets need to spin.

Does every point in cosmic space

touch every other point?

Can money buy creative thought?

Is dark the price of light?

Does every pain result in gain?

Does living have a goal?

And what’s left out when parts fall short

of summing up the whole

JUGGLER

The blue-black plate of sky

Teeters on a point of zenith

Like a juggler’s disc

Twirling on a stick.

Intrepid owls

Interrogate the

Intruding moon

Until splash jangling

Dawn splits

Night blue into

A billion oranges

Molded into a smolder.

Up comes the sane sun

Wheeling the lunatic

Moon on ahead and

Tumbles it off the brink

Of spinning sky,

To be caught by the

Juggler and thrown up

There perhaps again.

HOW I CLEAN

How I Clean

As a vaccer

I’m a slacker;

as a hacker

I’m a stacker.

I have trouble

sorting rubble

till it’s double

triple double.

I go all out

till I stall out,

then I haul out

all the fallout

HERE AND THE GROUND

Here and the Ground

The shiny car you drive is

going into the ground.

All the neighborhood trees are

going into the ground.

Buildings, all of them, are

going into the ground.

Your sofa and your dog are

going into the ground.

But soul—have you a soul

that won’t go into the ground?

What force can keep your essence

from going into the ground?

Suppose your body quits and

does go into the ground—

where will your soul then be?

My own says, “Here, right here.

“The love that makes life life is

dwelling in your here,

and all you ever gave is

coming back to your here.

“Thing and thing and thing may be

going into the ground,

but where can your here ever go

except—exactly here?”

PATH'S

Paths

Each path leads to another path

And that one to a third,

And on and on path leads to path

Until the way seems blurred.

The beauty of this path lies in

Its trodden permanence—

It beckons us to wear it thin

While traveling whence to hence.

This path winds gently left and right

As if ignoring straight—

Perhaps its founder had no sight

Or trod it very late.

Or did he follow waves of sound

That most folks fail to hear,

Which led him up and down and round

As far-off goals came near?

How paths begin we’ll never know

(The woods will never say),

But all who have a place to go

Are thankful for The Way

NIGHT

Upside-down flowers,

are we not? With stems

rooted upward into the deep?

Your soul, a kindly conduit,

umbilicates your body

into the placental night

that is fathomless and

fully empty of

where and when.

Take away the night? Absurd.

One night minus one night

equals one night.

Afraid of night?

Dread the shadows?

Learn from them.

Shadows tell stories,

emit fragrant meanings,

take you deeper than your feet.

Especially observe inner shadows,

even if they speak no words—

hear them out, and hear them in.

Look beneath shadows—

drop through into wider shadows

and feel safe in full bewilderment.

Afraid of unknowing?

Make your peace with it,

and your days may smile.

When you know definitely,

the vast night will remind you

that you know nothing.

When you wish for powers,

the night may wisely

hold them back.

But to be still with night

may bring you as much truth

as your heart can hold.

Night wants to abide

underneath your day

while you work—

wants to

enwomb you

between days.

Let night have its way,

its gentle way—

soften into its fullness.

Night is the container

of nothing less

than everything.