My pack lighter than ever,
the season late,
I haul myself over headlands
to Toleak Point. Near my ocean camp,
cow parsnip that danced
in spring breezes has gone
to seed, its leaves slug-nibbled.
Wild lily of the valley, a once-green carpet,
has grown yellow and wan.
Yet listen as the north wind rustles
the parsnip’s dry pods.
Lower your eyes
to the lily’s quiet fruit—tiny […]
A smile rides home
with me
after five days
of coastal backpacking
with old friends
and family.
I approach my single
man’s cottage,
know loneliness
is near,
nearer.
Is now.
What vast sweep
this feeling has,
how rich with fear!
I let the waves tumble
and tumble
me into the sand.
Finally,
cast ashore,
I rise
naked
in the sun.
For decades
I’ve returned
to this rocky outpost,
sat beside this lodgepole pine,
gazed across Rosario Strait.
With wife, daughter,
subsequent lover—
now with only
this borrowed dog.
Sun blurs my tears
into star flies
that moisten lichen,
and call forth a trumpet
of Canada geese.
Somehow
it all makes
sense.
Orcas Island
First a twitter
from out by the breakers.
Fresh from clouds,
a south-surging mass
traces tiny glyphs
in the wet sand.
Flap your
elbows,
flutter your
fingers.
They’ll
let you
join them–
one proud
peep
among a zillion.
Copalis Beach, Washington
Climbing on the rocks
love is felt as a tension.
But the danger of a fall is slight,
the cant of face and torso
against the sky,
timelessly sensual.
Always, my love,
The purr of the sea, odors of the tide,
and jutting rocks
will remind me
of this day
and of
You.
(No. 63 in a series of responses to Han-shan’s Songs of Cold Mountain)
In the summer, when we camp
along the coast,
the girls find good and evil
in the way over the rocks.
Grogon’s Lagoon leads to the cave
of the Evil Witch, dripping and dark.
There, she raises a poisonous poppy,
which only looks like miner’s lettuce.
The Good Witch’s grotto is open and light,
and the girls say she has sea anemones
from the Mermaid’s […]
Thirty-five years ago
I visited this rocky coast
with a long-haired hippie woman.
Skagit-eyes filled with the sea,
she ran along the shore,
far to the south.
How long was she gone?
Long enough for me
to become afraid.
Time looped,
anxiety pitted me.
Toward dark she returned, salted, alive,
thanking me again and again
for time given.
I managed a smile,
concealing fears
that shaped me
long after
her final
departure.
La Push, February, […]
January 4, 2003
The bike trail meanders
through jugglers and rollerbladers,
musicians and hustlers.
Drainage canals host gulls that laugh,
and flowers bloom among the beach grasses.
Pumping my rented fat tire bike,
I watch my daughter ride ahead.
Taking a deep breath of the
sunshine-and-smiles breeze,
I let my shoulders fall.
Relaxed.
(No. 40 in a series of responses to Han-shan’s Songs of Cold Mountain)
Having its share of inflations
and troubles
the boardwalk remains–
a sunny segment of community beach funk.
Too many sunglasses, incense sticks and Tibetan imports,
more rollerbladers than rastafarians or surfers.
Around one corner a palapas set, built for a movie,
Over there jugglers and musicians perform.
No muscle beach, the bodies are normal and flawed.
A red-billed, black-legged gull
reigns over it all,
laughing.
