Winking at the gods with those luminous blue green eyes,
the dragonfly sits perched on my knee, shoulder, head;
and as I duck under for another cool dip, she is there,
waiting, hovering in the golden bands of bright summer
sunlight while the loons' tremolo bounces off granite
boulders and the clearest of waters;

Alighting on a slender blade of grass, it feels as if she is
still watching me, at home on land or water as she is,
and perhaps wondering how something that giant
in proportion to her can stroke so effortlessly
in this shared medium, all seems fantasy
when the damsels are around;

How can I not carry that magic with me, as I pad barefoot
through the woods and up to the cabin, regarding the trillium
and lady's slippers speckling this part of the dappled forest floor
as high bush blueberries begin to bud and swell; soon we will
be picking these larger shiny blue orbs, so different from
the low bush kind with their powdery coating;

They thought I was crazy living that isolated in the woods,
but twenty five years later, a highway would widen
and encroach, bringing its jangling din to ears accustomed
to silence, and pollution in the form of algae blooms to those
pristine waters and where on earth does this not happen
eventually, and will humans ever treasure holy places
enough to leave those of us caring to steward them alone,
as we prefer to be, without trashing and slashing
sacred ground?

Goose Pond, back in the day ~ bj 2023