Passion in the Garden

In the long, empty night
I hear your song.

Longing I seek
but can only see
my own dying face
in shattered glass
and piercing steel.

I tremble in fear.
O, where have you gone?

Sing me again your soaring love-song

and show me the way,
for night’s a thin wall
and death, a porous veil.

(17 Apr. 2014)

To My Wife in Mourning

bright day,still birds, black
spots on the blue sky, slightly
sway in trees, and wait

for winter to stay
or summer at last to come
like we’re waiting for

the pain to stop, death
to give way to the winter
sun’s soft, warm embrace.

(for our son, Brian, 3/4/1986 - 3/25/2017)

Kentucky

Image: Fancy Farm, Kentucky

Summer steam

washes us clean

like a warm bath

as we wade through young fields, 

new corn waist high 

to where blue sky 

meets the rustling green sea.

We navigate by dead-

reckoning to the red barn. 

Wary of snakes, 

with flailing stick you flush 

out the tall, quick hares.

Feathers flashing, quail

burst heavenward at 

our clumsy approach, 

but in the dark barn 

we find 

forgiveness.

God's own light streams down 

into fragrant stalls

as wise eyes

regard us.

We reach out to touch.

They nod, 

first in warning,

then with bright approval.

(6 Feb 2012)

Suisun Spring

Photo: Brian Federle, "Camping" 3-25-2008


the green glow
of our cottonwoods
newly clothed in the gentle April sun ....

our apple tree,
still skeletal,
intimating cotton buds
promising green glory to come,

and the grass!
all winter-yellow evaporated,
shouting like a
third-grade leprechaun
skipping across the playground
in the school's St. Patrick's Day Parade.

but most unforeseen,
along the rough fence
the vinca
blazing with royal light
in the deep, verdant shade
of our cottonwoods.

(12 April 2010)