DRAGONFLY SONATA

A Dragonfly makes silent music

and yet I have heard it for all of my days.

As a dancing child,

I followed its lilting tune…

it’s arabesque of flight.

My imagination

attached pearlescent wings

to the angular blades protruding

from my childish back.

Loud and clear, the whirring duet

we played together

accompanied our dips and rises,

loops and hoverings.

Our landings were a crescendo

that no else could hear.

During my middle years,

the Dragonflies’ song was an invitation

to engage in a passionate pas de deux…

et trois, et quatres.

Love is the dance I mean

in its various guises.

Harmonies and disharmonies

were interwoven.

I often wept as we flew.

Entranced by the multitudinous mating dance

accomplished in mid-air,

my lover of the moment –

sharing my bliss –

 heard the melting notes of a cello,

and I fell with him into the wet grass

forgetting the dragonflies.

Now as I listen

for the very last movement

of this long sonata,

the dragonflies seem scarce…

their music not easily heard.

When I see one,

my old heart still rouses

at the longed for opportunity

to join the dance again.

Yet these days

even the dragonfly’s flight

seems more labored than before.

The soaring notes of childhood

are simply not there;

the sensuous drawn out love-dance

is a vague and uncomfortable memory.

Now the weighted silence

of the solitary diva

is profoundly beautiful…

 though dying out.

Enlightened

I am entranced by a new dance:

A small cat named pearl

has consented to be my teacher.

Last week

I was still grieving for Sunny,

still calling his name each time I opened the door.

On the lookout for what I had lost,

I found myself looking at shelter cats…

looking at every orange cat

intently searching for the one

 who weeks ago had moved on.

Standing in the midst of homeless animals

of every hue,

Sunny’s brilliant orange was obscured

by my tears.

I guess I stopped looking and began to see,

and out of the many

I saw pearl.

Tiny and gray and white

with just a smidgeon of pale orange,

she turned her emerald eyes upon me,

and I was smitten.

In the place where Sunny’s lush tail

plumed out from his large male body,

this diminutive cat has none.

This absence makes my heart grow fonder.

I can live with absence.

Companionship will get me by.

SEEDTIME

Returning from Portland, Oregon –

and a two week visit with Kendall

(best buddy in the world) –

my life-long friend,

I find myself waiting

for the promise realized there.

I was bathed in Beauty and companionship,

even as I luxuriated in time to rest.

Over the days

I felt myself gently lifted

from beneath the weight

of accumulated exhaustion.

Seeds of hope were planted that I might heal

from various maladies

oppressing my spirit in recent months.

I return bearing gifts:

 internal seeds of faith in my renewal.

In the Oregon forest,

we discovered a magical tree

wrapped round with ribbons

(a Cherry Birch we were told).

But for us, the magical realm of fairies was evoked.

A childlike wonder wrapped us round the tree.

And elderly as we obviously are,

we frolicked in its ambiance.

Oh, child-like joy remembered,

please dance me back to Kendall:

our mutual pleasure

our freedom in the moment!

Yet I am where I am,

one week and a whole day’s airplane journey removed.

I have returned to obvious loss:

Another lifelong friend

died unexpectedly during my absence,

and Sunny, my glorious orange cat,

is missing.

To be honest, I feel bereft

in the wake of so much gain,

though I have no doubt that I have gained.

And part of me knows I am

companioned still.

Both lifelong friends are in my heart:

And Sunny –

though he shared my life for a while –

was always alert to the call of the wild.

So…I try to remember

the seeds of my healing.

I wait for the light to ripen them

and for the wind to blow.