Here I Am

John Malone asked me, “Do you feel a poem coming on?”

My immediate response was, “Oh! I always feel a poem tickling the atmosphere in the labyrinth of my consciousness. I just don’t stop the other stuff I’m doing long enough to breathe and write.”

And here is my further response to John’s prompt:

Photo by Christian Murdock for gazette.com

Poems populate my mindscape

like thousands of clamoring wildflowers

on a sun-bathed hillside.

Tall stalks

crowned with brightly clothed blossoms

dancing in the fragrant wind.

Gathered clusters of blooms

huddled around the strewn rocks;

flower and stone conspiring

to capture my attentions.

Scattered floral starbursts

singing out their beauty

with evident joy

and unequaled fashionability.

Yet it is especially

the tiny sparkling circlets

of pure white petals

that whisper, “Here I am” –

that draw me closer,

to gasp in wonder,

hastening my heart beat,

prompting a long, peace-laden sigh;

that lock themselves into my memory

with color, symmetry, and natural rhythm,

happy to show the world

who they are.

And so I stand

and gaze upon

the lush and lovely flowers

sown upon the windswept hillside.

I love them,

and I leave them

where they are,

nodding and dancing and waving

this way and that,

wondrously arranged,

though randomly sprung up;

a sensuous anthology

of creative, chaotic design.

Gentle, yet persistent,

in the fruitful gardens

of my inmost being.