Leaves and branches,
Oscilloscopes tracing
Wind from gathering storms,
Taunt my habit
Of hunting curses
under each blessing
And copping exhaustion
To avoid getting the shakes
From a momentary lapse
Of despair. Sunlight
Always gets me down,
Keeping me inside lest
It warm my eyelids and ask me to rest
In a dangerously peaceful grace.

I’m not sure I know
How to say something earnest
when nothing is weighing me down,
Not sure how to speak
An uplifting word
Without the ashes
Of profanity
Clinging to my tongue.
There is a way of seeking joy
That requires
Gouging out one’s eyes,
And I like looking
Too much to try it,
Even on sale.

It’s easier to look
For beauty in the dark,
Glowing brighter the farther from
What is plainly seen.
If I learned to listen
A little more
To the upbeat bass line
Throbbing beneath
The frantic tenor
Of making ends meet,
Maybe I’d have
A little more
Levity
though I’d speak less.

That’s when I start to laugh,
Catching the joke
That fear is only joy
Hiding behind
Something we will not understand
Until it passes us by.
This is what the trees
Tried to say when
In the early morning
They stood, still and bronzed
In the rosy mist,
But I couldn’t hold
A smile long enough
To muster robust thanks.

Now that they scratch
One another and flail
Before the advance
Of autumn air,
I see plainly what comeliness
The failing light wants to hide
Where the glimmer is weakest.
How carelessly we fall
Back into hope.
So little a splash
Of fuel on a smoldering wick
Sets a lamp flickering, for you
Cannot burn out
What had never been lit.

Image: Clouds and trees in slanted light, my front yard in Tennessee, August 2020.