high tide line

These words
are sand after the tide
came and went
misplacing forgotten gifts
they look like broken shells
bits of seaweed
untied and wrinkled
slightly damp
in the shy sun
partially obscured
by her own hands

I think they were meant
to be something more
but without you
to pick them up
how is the giver
to give them?

Water Egg-Blue Planet

On the water egg-blue planet
is an island of trees
and black rocks
with a million eyes
deep-set holding
stories in their
empty light.

Each day the sky cracks
an eyelid, and a creamy milk
like a flower's skin,
or a blush
slowly fills the dark bowl
of night,

until the physical world
becomes itself again.

I want only one word
or two, a poem slight in build
and agile. A single thought
like a creek in summer.

So I cover the waters rushing
from my heart.

Last year in the summer,
on the 14th day of July,
an eaglet stopped breathing.

I know your breath stopped too,
for an instant. We all did.
From that moment on,

after the floods came,
something grew like a new forest.
We had never seen before.

Some would call this legacy.
A man climbs the spire of a cathedral
shaking in his brave boots. Pulls
the eaglet's body into the backpack,
waves at the camera,

to the world
so we could breathe again,
and the chopper flew her
to loving hands
who found the cause
and calmed us,

eventually.
Many hands. Much love.
Phoenix meanwhile churning
away invisible, to her next life.

And after, came courting
and sticks to the bowl
of great branches.

Mom laying bright circles of white light,
two for good measure. Dad busting out
with pride. Hatching. Growing.

And now here we are in the land
of celebration. The breeze and the ocean
gently clapping. Silly to think
this would ever be easy,

or a simple poem. Letting it all go
I sit with you my family in the wood,
the thousand eyes, on every limb
and shore.

Shhhhh.
Listen to our memory. To the gifts
piling up in front of us. The flutter.
The lift off. The next life,

and one who left us for greater things.




in deep gratitude
for Phoenix, and how you continue
to inspire us all.






July 14, 2010 Phoenix, an eaglet close to fledge
became ill and died on the Hornby nest #10. Worldwide,
observers where shocked and grief-stricken. Due to the
amazing efforts immediately afterward and ongoing,
Phoenix has continued to share her legacy and inspire
thousands and thousands of people and benefit other
eagles through donations to wildlife rehabilitation
facilities and ongoing research.

http://www.hornbyeagles.com

A Mother on the Beach



The sun feels a little too sharp,
so I stop to let it enter me. The world
begins to slow its frenzied rotation.
My skin is on fire, so I send my eyes
over the roll of wet voices. The ocean
is a mother too. How can I empty her
sad hands? The ocean, I'm told,
holds nothing forever. These are
questions a human asks of mystery.
Spirit world is another place
I've not yet been invited to. My eyes
look for its boundary, for the door
in between the cedars. For the
clasp, the old lock, for the word
that melts hinges. Surely my heart
knows the answer.

I look at my hands, mostly because
my head feels too heavy to hold.
The air is a heavy harp,
I cannot breathe. Why is the room
of grief so empty and why am I alone
here?

My son is as close as the next minute
and I can't figure how to connect
enough lines to map his destination.
I want him here. Oh for one long glimpse
of his skin, or the way he holds his head
when he's smiling. The light I recognize
as only coming from his eyes.

Enough. I beg the distant sky for silence.
For mercy. For anything to make this
unusual pain stop. And the waves
continue to sing so softly
for a moment I think I hear
his voice, feel for a second
something close to peace.





for Veronica-Lynn,
Orlando's mother




c2011 T.L.Stokes (all rights reserved)

Crow and the Dump Truck

Crows and ravens. First, let me tell you
about the crow. The raven comes later.
Jeff stops his dump truck in the middle
of the street. The cars had been driving
over the poor bird, flipping and rolling
a bundle of black wings. Traffic behind
the truck waits while the man scoops up
the crow, and stands there, quietly,
looking down at it. Then crow begins
to come back to himself and grips
Jeff's hand like he will never let go.
Jeff puts it by the building,
down in the cool grass. Later,
from work, he comes to check
on the bird who gathers strength.
Jeff, a tall, suntanned country boy,
takes a wheat thin from his lunch bag
and offers it. Crow takes it, and
flies off, each wing beat
a thank you reapeated;

like crows calling,
or water, splashing around rocks,
or ripples of something
that feels so good
it echoes.





for Jeff and the crow



c2011 T.L.Stokes (all rights reserved)

Orlando

The island looks smaller from the air.
Sheets of blue opening their arms
around the rock and sand hem,

like an old woman
left by her fisherman lover
in the innocent days,
now rising from a blue nest,

an island of her own heart.

The forest is reverently hushed,
pointing to the next life
and eagles nest in her hair.

You walk to the cove in your dark
boots looking at the sand like
a book, reading its indentations.

The breeze lifts the ends of your hair,
plays a little while you think.

Orlando could be anywhere.

You try to silence the sound of your
heart, and his mother. She is everywhere
even if she isn't with you.

The weight of the stone
within her is unbearable.
You listen again.

You finger the sand,
and the foot prints
and the places of no foot prints,
reading each word of no letters.

You listen to the wind, your grandfather,
who steadily hums. His words
are vibrations we measure
inside our heads.

You look to the tall sky disappearing
into the hands of a black night.

We try to light what we cannot see
and some cry. It is easier to wait
with a mission in your breast
and your feet falling one
in front of the other,

than in the camp of mothers.

You would hope Orlando's mother
was out too, in a boat or
inside the bird searching.

The waves came to shore this morning
with empty hands.

The breeze lifts a few thin limbs,
leaves use sign language.

You close your eyes, stand facing the sun.
The red kayak will open its secrets.

Listen,
listen to even that which is silent,
it talks too.





for Orlando and his family
and the Hornby Island search effort

c2011 TLStokes (all rights reserved)

http://www.timescolonist.com/news/Intense+search+underway+missing+teen+Hornby+Island/5036260/story.html