Hole In The Wall
—Valdez Island


I see you step into the void

again and again, your fall played out

on a retinal screen of gray/blue spin 

water to sky / sky to water

the vertigo drop guaranteed 

to bunch me like a spider


You must have heard my careless climb

rattling the dry pine and sometimes 

in my mind it’s you who’s unaware

we're two hundred feet above the sea 

but it was me who didn’t see you 

tensing on the bough of the madrona


Expressions of our lives set free

can be like eagles stepping

into parabolic flight

and I feel that same snap--

the outward rise of wings

caught by thermal springs

last of the summer light