Cottonwood

I wanted to dance

in your carefully curated pile of leaves

cottonwood contained

a green that glows

in the trueness of disbelief

like grass growing

along the edges of those watery wishes...

they come again…

a return to closed eyes and open hearts

a shot in the dark

clear in consciousness

to the surrender of what won’t break

I wonder in this space what it will take

to shake trees from leaves that cling to cotton

a grace that calls to be forgotten

in hollow hiding

filled with amber light

reminding me to drop heavy in flight

landing upon piles of porcelain

in bare bones that fracture at a fall

promising to fuse in a force of fire…

I said good night to all your ghosts…

while lighting flames to collections that require

my rage and refusal to open fully

in a forest filled with poison that climbs upon my branches

a toast

to the shaken limbs

to the piles of cottonwood contained

to the wood ash that serves as garden remains

to the trueness in doubt

I dance upon seeds that lie in dormancy

because what thunders above

conjures the courageous

to rise below from contempt and contamination

polymorphic piling

in purification.