Here

author's note:

I may not be Mother Nature’s son…

But maybe she appreciates the way I respect her.


HERE

Here
I’m sheltered by the forest trees
yet feel vulnerable because
here
I’m a stranger alone:

vulnerable as a child--
is nature my mother?
No

the connection broke long ago:
those trees offer no comfort--
all they do is watch me
from a distance
I can not bridge.

But in uncertainty, I open
to the feeling of mystery
to the quiet dark grandeur here.
I feel myself grow small--
I’m no more important
than that stone.

Maybe even less.

Yet experience myself
as a special individual
because I feel
so strangely alone.

But lifted by wonder
I also experience the stone
as a special individual…
the waterdrop on that leaf...

the tree frog.

Listening to Silence: poetry ebook
© 2021, Michael R. Patton