RUSTIC RITUAL
(in Santa Rosa, California)
Here at a peaceful day-lily farm and ranch
tucked below green hillsides topped with pines,
the mourning doves -- a shy and cozy cluster
forever caged -- are cooing up the sun.
Wakened by their velvet language, we listen...
Then suddenly no doves, no after-notes
nor resonating choir -- rippled chuckles
silent...Then drawn to some mysterious force
the murmurs rise anew in poignant chords --
such primal promptings bound to lift the sun;
babbling concern, they coax the golden eagle
until the fledgling flies on freshened wings.
All night the lilies of the day have grown
in condensation sipped by thirsty stars,
color deepened to golden harvest moons --
a simple scene, and yet complex as God.
After breakfast we will coo to doves,
will whisper, want to set them free as air
to roost among the pine trees, forage grasses
for what doves most require beyond their cages.
(c) Claire J. Baker
Nature - 2nd H.M. Poets Dinner 2008
Written in Blank Verse
