For I Am Oriole

I’m waiting for the oriole.

I’ve bought the orange suet,

placed it as an offering outside.

I’ve meditated on its Latin name

and contemplated Audubon’s religious

rendering in his Holy Birds of America.

May First is almost here and that’s the date

which marks their resurrection in the Valley.

I promise not to swear when hearing golden voices in the air!

I’ve really done as much as I can do, although

this afternoon I’ll go out and buy a genuine orange,

slice it nicely into numbers I’ve been told in dreams

sing like magical attraction to the lovely flying one

and nail them on the wind. The truth will come

and when it does I’ll wear its black and orange feathers

timelessly and naturally in the hot intention of the Sun.

Defrosting Cherry Blossoms

I’ve been noticing the cherry trees 

along my usual ways. And it appears 

they’ve been damaged by this yin yang 

New England April weather— 

the warm and sunny afternoons were quite

enough to tease the blossoms into budding

but the cold Canadian whiskey freezing

nights have stopped them in their tracks.

And so a year without the cherry blossoms!

Not that we’re Kyoto or further Hirosaki—

and this Valley doesn’t have the tributes of a Washington DC.

Although our monuments aren't built to Empire either— 

they’re more about the revolution. Transformation.

And the Universe is just a speck of Consciousness

smaller than a mustard seed. Space reveals imagination—

light-years shine within unseasonable awareness.

The Way of the Bird

This is the season of The Birds. 

This morning I was watching Goldfinches 

chase each other through the sunny 

emptiness of April Woods

around the early green of newborn

leaves on old exploding branches.

Serious Cardinals walked beneath

the recently-filled bird feeder looking

for the scatterings of sunflower seeds.

I was standing by the Picture Window

feeling all this separation

human habitation gives me.

Meanwhile Ranjit is speaking of

the Way of the Bird, a pristine freedom,

not from my conditioning

but freedom of that unborn self,

freedom from all karmic fruit

of action, like forgiveness of

the Magnitude of Nothing to forgive.

The only picture window is

the memory of this Little Mind.

The Apple that I ate is knowledge

and it’s bitter seed belief.

I spit it out and I could watch

the Cardinals scramble for its Meaning—

but I fly away.