We wash our hands with coffee grounds & light,
& pulse still.

New water
reaches for our air
in your coffee/tea temple’s
constellation of plants.

Out-of-doors, Canada Road
hides under sharp snow,
shares forward-steps
& sideways triple-steps with us,
dances impromptu swing.

Brown-beige blanched
façades lost
in hollowed histories
this shortened sun-span,
before the inner Witness ~
spectator of sleep,
who records dream-scenes
to show us when we wake &
watch the mind chase its
favorite addiction, forgetfulness.

Metronomes motion us forward,
& questions we have to live raw ~
“Where do I come from?
Why am I born? Who am I?
What on Earth am I supposed to be doing?”

Soundtrack of sweet machine hum
(wise/blind driven cars)
as our mantras burn dross off
inner gold
til we’re left
with precious metal nerves,
raw honey color with no resistance ~
no impedance to electric currents
in the universe’s circuitry.

We exhibit
fluid blue movement,
as bootprints write
a rough draft script
across white-out sidewalks,
beside finely-etched souls
in this memorable detail
of a gigantic print ~
scene from a seagull’s free
360 degree
sky-sight.

One hundred footsteps from Wolastoq’s
calm flow, as she slips into
her patched coat of ice floes,
as crosshatched geometry
of the iron international bridge
bonds
Canada with the States ~
we share one chocolatine pause
before the salted sweetness
of our daily “À demain.”

Hour & minute hands
attempt to grasp us
by the ankle
if we are not watchful ~
thirst
to be There
though we’re Here.

Time takes forever
& never resolves ~
suspended chords’
endless progression.

In our timeless space,
I whisper “We don’t have to talk.”

We walk slowly, wordlessly watch
crystalline wind & birches’ bare limbs
wave inner water,
lean over the Saint John River
that forever murmurs
Keep going, keep going, keep going.

I remember wet canvas ~
floral palette of famous Fall hills,
soon denuded by blizzard winds.

Almost absent distant scent,
burnished gold & scarlet sheets
of time-turned leaves
pen endless letters
with webs of veins.

Now is the time
tenacious branches
encourage/urge us forward,
while our dovetailed
December fingers
warm one another.

Our wide indigo vision,
one Witness behind two minds,
two pairs of blue pearl eyes,
watches astonished at the whole show
appearing now at our Globe Theatre’s
precipitous cusp of winter.

You drop my jaw with
“What is this world?
It’s all…powder!”
I can’t argue with the truth, dear.

At 11:11 p.m. I sketch our silhouette
from memory ~
we appear here, wear
dark lines & circles
spread out upon a pale page,
our secret alphabet of waking up.

My words/this world ~
emptiness
outlined with pen & ink.

What seems to form a poem,
a person or two,
a universe’s “one turning” ~
frames for the same blank space.

This scene is half dream
sketched from memory
to murmur in images,
spotlight on past delights…
half spontaneous scribble
in an overcrowded figure-drawing class ~
once upon an indigo
segue into winter-night.

We are always in transition.