Midsummer
In the Northern hemisphere, Summer Solstice is the longest day, and Midsummer is a few days past Solstice. The days start getting shorter a degree at a time. We settle into the long summer to raise flora and fauna babies—how many species on earth? I watch the changes in vegetable and flower gardens and trees as sprouts turn into plants and leaves.
I sit on a second-floor-porch
rocking chair with a book open in my lap.
Earlier I saw the dawn break
through a cloudy sky, and watched the sun rise.
Now I pull my consciousness
into the lettered world.
I set this day aside for the luxury of reading.
My awareness telescopes
between small and large plains
of being: words and birds.
My eyes follow the birds
flying back and forth from
the castle turret to the tree top
straight ahead of me. I pick
up their songs, a dialogue
I do not recognize.
Back to the book
where lines of type unroll and English words
lean forward Into phrases and discoveries.
This is a language I know well.
And this is the ideal midsummer,
When protests and letter writing
can be set aside for words and birds,
flowers and feathered friends.
Please respect my copyright.
