Sunday morning prompt: Wake up some part of your participation in nature – what
will please you when you go out there, what will delight you, what is offered –
use all senses.
At first I was aware
only of the outer me,
face in the cold, damp air,
hands stuffed in warm pockets,
feet planted in the bedraggled grass at pond’s edge.
Wavelets moved in stately fashion
in response to a breeze I barely felt.
A single white swan floated.
A single gray heron flapped.
A single black crow called.
In that moment I felt myself let go.
My heart beat—measured, stately—
matched the waves
that bore the swan,
that lured the heron,
that listened to the crow.
I was the wave, the birds, the minimum breeze.
My breath was theirs,
their heartbeats mine,
in that consciousness that holds us all at once
in the palm of its hand.
