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I have a friend who commits himself to one full hour of poetry writing every day.
I don't know who he thinks he is,
jerk!, early-riser recluse,
he's no religious realist.

I too would give myself away
if not held in by plans and a picture window pointing West
where the sky has lived throughout the day
without me noticing.

Letting me inside, the lovers eye will not release,
it presses warm upon the skin of poems within
while I in countless coming moments
will betray that touch and truth and beauty,

Feeling myself the worst of perpetrators
having turned from the purple dusk
to hear the sigh of God
wishing I had never glanced.

Every poem is provisional

There

There

There
I can hear the whisper of the breeze upon each leaf
I can count each one,
can paint with precision,
caress the naked fact of each one's color.
I can tell the story of each one's life.
I can tell the truth of every leaf on every branch on every tree --
tall, small and in between -- on every rounded acre
of the holy land of my inheritance,
where knotty logs raise high stories home,
so moist in the morning,
where the dung of my horse is fresh alive--
useful to the soil and to my soul,
where prayer at dawn is sighed
like the sorrel sway of a buckskin brother’s tale.
There, where still ponds of glass remind of world's past
and mountains keep a watchful eye
and cool quench the streams supply
I with cowboy-Christ can labor through the day
till dreams of moonrise and fire-dance
console the trees at sundown.