You are in My Circle

To Karl A.

 

You wore your grief unseen like

your skeleton: always there but never

directly in view unless you know the landmarks

to watch for after your true love dies.

 

What was it like, your passing?  Did it quietly ring with

Amazing Grace going on ahead?  Did you lean out

of your body, moving like clouds announcing a storm?

Was it like a math equation, never anything

but fixed and perfect?

 

Wherever and whatever you are, (or perhaps

you are undefinable) I am drawing a circle

of gratitude wide enough to encompass your compassion,

all your great glad works lighting our hearts, and more,

I am drawing the hoops and loops that humble and hold us in unity,

to invite one to kindness, to sow peace in an unpeaceful world,

and to affirm that you are magnificently loved

like numbers love their own square root.

 

J. Pratt-Walter, ⓒ 2022

A Wet Unity NaPoWriMo #9

This everyday miracle

unites us all.  The river skips onward

but trades its wet song

with every cell in every life.

The whole sea is found

in a single drop:  Hydrogen, oxygen,

sodium chloride,

niched in every corner

we name “life.”  My tides,

your waves fall and rise

in this unity of forever

simmering here in the sea

of our blood.

J. Pratt-Walter  © 2020

ECLIPSE

Eclipse

the hate out of our

collective hearts,

Moon.

We are waiting, shimmering

in the crescent shadows

of hope.

We are in a profound

totality

where sadness and fear are

living shadows

in the spirits of the people

so invisible there is no map

to shield them.

Grant the ones fainting

on the margins of

your town, your

nation,

the promise of being seen

before the roiling darkness

unmeasures

the light behind their

biding eyes.

J. Pratt-Walter,  8/2017