Not Alone

Boquete 

 

I sit, I watch.

Clouds whisper secrets shrouded in white breath, 

When a misty rainbow springs to life.

Its roy-g-biv flavors arch perfectly across the sky, reminding me of Lucky Charms, 

till they fade into faintness, 

A friend leaving me. Hungry. Alone. 

 

Decorating the updrafts 

in slow, soft circles, gliding,

Gliding, gliding – 

black vulture families –  

enticed by the aroma of carrion, 

Hover, drift and map their next meal,

And make my neck ache, 

as I crane my head up 

to follow, and feel left out.

 

I hear a hushed voice instruct me, “Listen closely for clues,

let yourself be drawn in, feel your connection, 

lose your barrier of skin – surrender –

let go, let go, let go.”

 

So I become the constant flow of the river,

Water smoothing the hard, sharp rocks.

Water that turns to mist, 

And shatters against the boulders and stones,

again and again, and

erodes them one grain at a time, 

before I drift back to the call 

of  the coalescing clouds,    

 

I am a vulture, bloody nasty when I feed on a carcass, 

Magnificent when I glide.

I hitch a magic ride on wind and vapor, 

And rise higher and higher as the ground recedes. I am not alone.

                                                                                  

I taste the leaves of trees against my tongue as I, invisible wind, 

Descend down, down, down

the rich velvet green slopes and ravines

of Jaramillo and Baru, 

Shifting from calm caress to cathartic wrath, back and forth, back and forth, playing music with all my friends.

 

I  rise as vapor and embrace air, our arms entwined,

Soaring to new heights, painting new clouds

as I cumulusly, cirrusly, spontaneously dance across the sky,

Nimbusly, fearlessly high, then laugh, 

in freefall, 

till I crash and splash, and spread myself around,  only to rise again.

 

I am this moment,

everything

in this moment,

As the hushed voice whispers,

“You have questions? Listen for clues. You are always welcome. River, wind, rain, your friends,

Always speak the truth.”   

 

I sit, I watch, I am.

My friends speak. I am. 

Not alone.