Living in the earth,
bodies and arms filled with birds,
living in the sky.

Evening birds call,
bullfrogs talk to each other,
we walk and listen.

The limit of words—
a hidden oriole sings,
never ending green.

Full of silver fish,
the lake, surrounded by sound—
blue on blue sky days.

More alive each day,
budbreak season in the woods
all kinds of green light.

I know what matters,
sun on my back for decades,
birds in all my arms.

The wind in these trees—
gathered in their high branches,
sent across the lake.

Poets are teachers—
they enter the deep forest
and come back to tell.

A red-winged pair here,
their call caught in the grasses,
becoming their world.

Earliest spring moss—
like stars on the forest floor,
made of the same thing.

We circle the lake—
Robins hop from branch to branch,
willows glow yellow.

A flock of kinglets
move in the understory,
the moss greening first.

We hear them coming,
over the red-wing marsh bed,
six geese break their V.