Land Walker

When I’m sitting by the water listening

to the wavelets of the tidal river

lapping the stones

lining the shore

my mind softens

into its own silence

to make room for this lulling

the gentle sloshing reminds my cells

of their amphibian ancestors

that flourished in my mother’s womb

where food and shelter

were one with what I was

without thought, words or wanderlust

I guess I lived enlightened for a spell

My blood now moves

mixed with strange notions

of how I, a land walker,

should move through this world

and stake my claim

raised to think there’s somewhere to go

other than here,

that the moon and mars

are mine if I want them

But as the fires lick

the great Sequoias out west

and towns vanish in a flash

as in a magic act

and we write headlines in all caps

to stave off the waves

of heartbreak on the horizon,

I wonder how we became

so estranged from our home

forgetting how good

she is to us