Water above
and below
and still I thirst.

My other life flies
in all directions,
but here
there is one thing
and the lake is another,
and in the clear light
beneath it All
I know everything
I need to know.

The forest
is retreating. Death is
easy and in soft focus,
with roots believing
they will feel
their moist home again
after a cold
ebony sleep,
after waiting on the
other side
of Light—

Now this I understand.

It never was what
can be seen,
not even the swans like
feathered nymphs, too
beautiful to be real
anyhow, and not even the
sky, inverted, glaring back,
burning in ice, or the
chaste oaks with leaves
on a mission, or even
my cat, little killer
and hero.

It's what waits beneath,
what sprouts,
pure and knowing,
in the unseen,

what floats
as nothing and all things,
truth and untruth,
the dark that is also light,

beyond this,
beyond touch,
beyond form,

in the endless center
of every center
where we begin,
where all is one.


Patricia Joan Jones