Glide

I want to latch my mind

onto the back of a butterfly and let it take me

off, gliding past bushes and hedges,

swerving by faces and paws,

whiskers, beaks and speeding cars

up, up

to flutter around treetops,

when I can step off and walk along the longest branches

to gaze out

at everything.

See all the possible choices

spread out like drunken scrawls on a map,

overlapping and diverting,

all hinging

on one point, one inciting incident that leads into many.

There is no point in looking back at what might have been,

those pathways have already crumbled.

I can only look forward

and hope the winds from the multitude of wing beats

don’t sweep

my self away.

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New green

Pulling away the wasted,

darkened leaves;

limp limbs

both deprived of sustenance

yet fed too much;

l cast them out on the ocean

and watch them sink

below the surface.

Now the new growth can be seen

striving up towards the light.

 

Ripples

A ripple in a glass of water

can never leave the glass.

Yet if the glass ever cracks,

the water can push against it,

working away to force an opening.

Even if the gap it makes is only

wide enough for a trickle to escape,

sometimes that trickle is all that’s needed.

Seeping across the table,

weaving its way through discarded cutlery,

crusted salt and pepper pots

and past dusty, fine china plates

to the edge, where droplets form

ready to drip into the dry soil

filling the plant pot below.

The fresh seeds lying in wait

beneath the surface

will finally get

their spark of life.