Slow Dance

He sits before the sunset
and wonders
at the planet’s slow language,
which slips by
in words longer than lifetimes,
sung to the lyrics of lichen
longing for translation
as fading light falls
through the cave
at just the right angle
across a living tapestry
so that it bursts
into luminous flame.

And he stares into golden night,
wondering what whispered secrets
the clouds keep;
like how to fade into blue,
dissolve into nothing
and then return
to dance with air and floating seas,
the river of silk singing a duet
with the near-static tongue of sunset
in a melody it takes a lifetime to hear.

Nimbus-clouded voices,
we get to dance with floating water,
we get to be wildness and wet
every time we fall,
every time we are drawn
back up into the blue;
until the only dream that’s left
is to sing slow words
and wait
for one day each spring
when the sun sets
at just the right angle
to light us all up.

TRACE

Phytolinguists

The Layers