Poem Thirty: Lord of the Seven Hills Excerpt

We are jasmine flowers

wrapped around your feet.

Poem Twenty Eight: Milk

If you think of milk

as consciousness—

Poem Twenty Six: Apple Excerpted

the theory of everything

grows smaller,

the size of a hand

closing around an apple.

*

Poem Twenty Eight: Excerpt The Spotted Honeyguide

Put your hand 

over the side

of the boat.

Poem Twenty Four: Purification

*

The joints of one person

become the next.

*

Poem Twenty Three: Mirror Excerpt

I mirror you 

in reverse.

Poem Twenty Two: Pomegranate

I am crowned with heartbreak

or new beginnings.  

Poem Twenty: Sacrament Excerpt

Where there was a god

filled with the pollen 

of song, there is ash.

Poem Twenty: The Coming of the Bees

Their bodies make

flowers sing.

Poem Eighteen: Datura Excerpt

a single female pistil

emerges from the throat

of the flower. 

Poem Seventeen: Ark

The earth itself

will swallow you.

Poem Eighteen: Tree Worship

This is the place 

of leaping.

Poem Sixteen: Rainforest Excerpt

When you reach for something

beyond yourself

That’s when you 

have meaning.

Poem Fifteen: Rainforest excerpt

Spirits, smoke, forgotten gods.

Poem Fourteen: Cranes Excerpt

 Should we pray 

 to the sun?

 How large are you

 in comparison 

 to the moon?

Poem Thirteen: Volcano Excerpt

We are the lost

and found.

Poem Eleven Excerpt: Redwood

Your roots speak

in mantras, benedictions, 

Nirvana, the Holy Grail.

Who is listening?

Poem Eleven: Redwood
Call and Response for the Forest

(For three or more voices or group/solo alternation)

LEADER:
Tell me your secrets,

RESPONSE (ALL):
And we will tell you ours.

LEADER:
You are a medium.
You are a prophet.
You are a preacher.
You are a prayer.

ALL:
We are listening.

LEADER:
Can I put my ear
to your chest?

ALL:
We are listening.

LEADER:
Your heart is a drum.
Your roots speak in mantras,
benedictions, Nirvana,
the Holy Grail.

ALL:
We are listening.
But are we hearing?

LEADER:
Your leaves are amulets.

ALL:
They sound the alarm.

LEADER:
Your boughs speak,
portend, pray,
bear witness.

ALL:
We are listening.

LEADER:
Who will hold out their hands
and say—

ALL (with rising force):
Stop.

LEADER:
Who will hold the earth
beneath your feet?

ALL:
We will hold.
We will hold.

LEADER:
You are gods.
You are ancestors.
You are oracles.

ALL:
You are not ours to take.
You are not ours to burn.

LEADER:
Who will forgive
our trespasses?

ALL:
Only the forest.
Only time.

LEADER:
We wake.
We sleep.
We wake.
We sleep.

ALL (softly):
We forget.
We forget.

LEADER:
Make us into wood.
Make us into canoes.
Make us into memory
that floats.

ALL (rising together):
We will go timeless without you.
We will go rootless without you.
We will go lost without you.

ALL (soft, closing whisper):
You are sacred.
Let the ceremony begin.

Poem Nine: Field Notes: “No-Mind” (無心, Mushin) , Excerpted Line

If your mind understands 

no mind.

Poem Eight: Monarch/Danaus Plexippus

What is your carbon footprint

if you can’t trace it in the sand?

Poem Seven: Glacier Excerpted Line

Let the arrow of this song

be possessed by the spirit 

who lives inside 

of the glacier.