I was blessing a great pine tree
and being blessed,
the silver waters moving
from human to tree,
from tree to human core
and the sky spinning above...
and the sweet grasses of earth
drifting tiny, delicate jewels
of autumn seeds in the air,
and my beard seed-full
from having nuzzled the earth,
telling my old mother
I love her with my body.
And a gray squirrel eating pine seeds
from a cone, like a hungry child
ratcheting a cob in its hands rapidly
in a 4th of July corn eating contest:
and the seeds spinning down in whirliggigs
into my hands until the squirrel
finished and poot! tossed the shaved core
of a cone carelessly over its shoulder
and down upon me.
Then the squirrel dives upside down
and starts coming down
that huge, gray tree trunk highway
I was hugging,
its scrawny legs stretched
wide like a spiders,
like a circus safety net of fur,
like a tense glove,
toes miraculously gripping
the bark, moving in quick, jerky
sporadic spurts, head first
coming right at me, face to face,
and me in wonder, but the worm of my mind
thinking what if it should come right up
and bite my nose!
And the squirrel, bobbing and staring,
suddenly unsure if I was a tree...
Perhaps I bore the blessing
of one and it couldn't differentiate.
And I speaking softly, calling love
upon it, and the squirrel jerking this
way, scimp, fwrimp, around the tree,
pip, up to peer, making me out to be a man,
and upside down twirling,
suddenly shot into another tree,
a couple scrimps, and scoots, and shibang
on legs that couldn't be seen,
even as a blur, dipping down into long
sensual grasses!
And I laughing, and leaning,
and thanking the God who breathes
though all things and me.