Passive ArchitectThe Calmness of an Unhurried Culture Remains
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Let’s fill our castles full
of trinkets, deep wool scarves
feather beds and niceties.
The next generation will
split the wealth among farmers.
The earnings of a final generation
the overgrowing ivy
an abandoned mansion
managing a gnarly tree in
the drawing room.
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Ireland Unfolds
Streaming brook into a river
fallen leaves to the fairy forest
a poet’s stone resting beneath the tree
reads ‘Don’t place me in our pocket.’
The man buried beneath the giant chestnut warned.
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In Ireland they write on buildings
gold inscriptions
unlocking passages
tangled roots of one cedar
making an entire forest grove.
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The Cemetery above the Stream
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We find cemeteries that keep on going
the beginning of one in Roscrea led us
to a stream and
we began to crawl over more and more hills.
The Celtic crosses reach to the sky
the stones buried a perimeter of the earth there
crushed gravel paths
small plants under cracked glass
with iron covers a perfect place to be buried
but a glorious place to be alive.
The Adare Manor
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Phil turned the creaking
handle to unlock the thick
wooden door.
The manor and the hovering
Cedar of Lebanon
over a sun-setting palace.
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Wood engraved holding half-moon windows
scrolling hatches clicked and locked
loud echo’s silencing our steps
into deep carpet
‘We’ve been expecting you’
the thick red tapestries
blanketing the windows
looking out of our
jewelry box dream.
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It was six o’clock, but it felt like ten
gracious time pausing to be caught up with
my thoughts vanishing – relaxing.
We walked searching for people,
a center to the city Dublin
waking up.
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Leaf covered sidewalks alongside
the river Liffey
with sea gulls’ sounds calling
there are poems on the buildings
carved letters in the stone balconies
‘Except the Lord but our labor built…’
the words moving in and out
as the buildings turned and
could no longer be read.
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Welcome to real Ireland
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We slipped away
into a dream
my smile was worn out
before we left.
This trip was momentous
a page turning, the new bloom
a bookend.
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Brush strokes pushed upon the shore.
Ireland, home to the hills,
the midst, the fairies, the folklore
and now us.
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Dressing up and dressing off
.
In Vegas we stayed at a castle
a screaming floor full of ‘winners’
they’d made it here
landed in a bleak desert
from the sky or over dry land.
.
We’ve projected beyond
the desert people camps
the lonely fifty mile road
through a reservation
to a glass U walk suspended
over a natural wonder.
.
But most people stay
in Vegas, if they visit Nevada
the ‘on’ switch turns at 8pm.
Quiet malls become clubs with
long lines and the noise of the street
belongs inside by night.
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Peace may only rest in the cliff cracks
of Zion two hundred miles east.
It hovers over the city dwellers, peeking around city buildings, train travelers, and from the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.
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The next day, we closed in on the South Rim
the north face of Humphreys began to fade
to a mere backdrop
left to stand with common tourists in the
amazement of nature
over the erosion of another natural wonder.
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Caught It!
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Climbing Humphreys
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We walked a grass meadow to the forest edge
the lime green new growth of the pine
spread and opened a mile in to expose a hill of rock
too great for human hands
The easy slow switch backs lead through Aspen
tall white trunks rise from the fern forest floor.
We stumble over large rocks and exposed roots
the first two miles, getting acclimated to 11,000 ft
and then the knee lifts begin, slow scrambling past
false peaks to make it on top of an ancient volcano.
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There is a constant buzz at 12,633 feet, a live hive
hungry flies we see
south mountains draped in pines
a soft carpet of Aspen lies in the valley crooks below
The 360 degree view affords us the view of the North Rim and Walnut Canyon by just turning
a simple circle.
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The next day we watched Humphreys in the rear view mirror
Onward to see the Grand Canyon South rim as
soft sandaled tourists.
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(50/50 Photos were taken by my husband or me.)
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Flagstaff
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Thirty miles north of Sedona
lives the summer homes
of most desert dwellers, and the shadow
of Arizona’s highest peak.
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We’d come to ‘Flag’ to climb Mt. Humpheys
the day of rest before
found us lolly-gagging around
easily paved tourist attractions that left
us feeling empty.
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We ate across the tracks before the train
bisected the city again
a hipster town, complete with
a university from the
historic landmarks
old hotels where New Years Eve
parties were spent watching
the pine cone drop
outside the Weatherford Hotel.
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Humphreys began at the low pine spread
easy, slow switch-backs in the Aspen forest
a bright green fern floor before the tall
white legs
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Careful steps climb for two-thirds of the way
watching roots and rock trip your feet
until knee lifts climb you the
last tired third to the top
the sand and lava rock tundra
of a volcano we can make out
at the peak, over the rock scramble
blew one million years ago.
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A live hive by the top
small hungry flies at 12,000 feet
mountains south of us were draped in pines
a soft carpet of Aspen lies in the valley
crooks below the mountain.
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