My personal journal showing the last couple sentences on 8/18 about packing an emergency go-bag for possible evacuation. Today’s poem was inspired by the weird rouged light this morning. You can see the tiny ash particles that have been falling for a couple days on the dry leaves in the yard.
Smoke Blushed Fog
Morning is draped in foggy blush
drunken over-colorized rouge
Too much, everything’s too much
COVID, wildfires, raining ash
The day’s very greeting light
and happy hour scrims hysterically gold
Eastward crow’s caw muffled
in atmospheric confusion
their westbound flight to shrouded home
I trusted nature for answers
like a wise braided grandmother
On closer inspection Granny’s corn woven blanket
infested by swarms of moths
My heart breaks as she shivers in her once resplendent cloak
I wake and go to sleep
swirling in numb dread
staving off bad news
manufacturing any kind of distraction
Because it’s all too much
Will we ever again sit around
star canopied fire rings?
I yearn for ancient drumbeats
true north constellations
So now I must invoke sage and cedar
Remember tree seeds pocketed
in an old rainy day coat
Listen for my ordered heartbeat
my grace given breath
knowing nature
Will prevail
