The Path
Of a time I would unrarely walk a trail near my house,
I might bring a gun with me, or not, for ruffled grouse.
Half a mile to reach it through a stubbled field of grain,
I suppose there are a thousand paths like this up here in Maine.
And yet, to me it seems, this one is somehow special,
to the animals living near, yes, but to me antithetical
in a world exploding with insanity that I should have this place
apart from everything that haunts the vex-ed human race.
Every step, if you choose to stop, presents a different view
of golden brown or darker hues, an aromatic autumn brew.
There may be mud or new-born ice to challenge you on the way
But on this joyful jaunt into virtue, that's totally okay.
Thickly wooded, half evergreen, and half now denuded,
of all the vice and cacophony of life out here excluded
from the modern world that values so much that is wrong
with everything born of lust, pain-- the maddening throng.
Give me a path, innocent and wild and long.
Leave me to listen to the wind and the water's song,
Then come for me only if I never return.
Take no offense if I should thee briefly spurn.
For I have tasted reality here, distant from it all,
I've seen the chipmunks dance and the stubborn leaves fall,
I've tasted the essence from which we've derived,
So much that's lost that may never be revived.
(At Amity, 12.22.16)