Song of beasts

I take my shoes off

each stone my foot melds to

kissed with the glow:

hello, hello

of the burning on my skin

of the gentle

blowing through my fingers, the cowpoke

rustling,

the Thrushes reedy trill,

and

trace my toes along the tracks of vultures, whitetails

and up the path

to the calling

of the Towhee's mewing for his mate

hidden deeper

in blackberry bushes

I cross stone walls

like secret gates

Whatever wounds had been there

are scars

that mud and grass

on foot soles

do fade

The sweet chime of emerald frogs

in beds of water

ripple largest in a heart

than its fury quakes

do your feet hurt, he asks, catching me;

my sandals swinging

breezy in the the dusk,

No,

I know my home

and always will:

as the aspens

echo out warm June sighs,

I'll never know another place

That sings more in my soul

than a sunset

of gold and purple

and eyes of hazel green

that follow laughing

as I pick rocks along the road

this is all I ever need

This will always be my my home

the trees and birds and sky and earth

have held me tight

when the lights were bright and noise too harsh

and everything felt like a war

when the surface of society was suffocating,

so I suffocated even more

I drowned it out in bottles, ashes and suffering,

in a rage and tempest

to make nature's greatest storms

seem benevolent,

harmless little things

and so

Running to the trees,

to climb into safety of their boughs

Shelter in the mosses,

on the boulders in mist and rain and clouds

the solace is not lonely

relentless love followed me here

and coaxed so slowly

Reminding

that there is still love yet,

for beasts here

No light is without its shadow

it is perhaps the light

that is most feared;

then to hide that light in shadow

it would only disappear