Today we went on a motorbike ride in the sunny Sunday afternoon, down to the river where the rocks are warm and the bugs are lazy. The water was too cold for toes but not for beetles. I saw eight hawks circling in the sky, a rara avis in an invisible meeting place. I watched them watching me. They told me it was going to rain. Then they told me they knew the secrets of the kingdom of heaven. But we have forgotten how to listen. I stared hard and tried to open my ears as they circled round and around. Then the wind picked up and they disappeared over the ridge of the escarpment. We got back on the bike and drove southwest, where the sun was melting into ocean-coloured clouds. On the way home it started to rain. All I can say is the birds knew.

~lg

Sit by me awhile
Let’s talk about God and the stars and the distant seashore
Hold my hand lightly and smile
We’ll look for our future in the cloud shapes above
Tell me a story
The kind you save just for me
We are friends and strangers and lovers
Bound to one path and to each other
Love is a mystery
And the soul is a deep place
Let me in and let me swim

~lg

Hey prophet
Keep your eyes clear
You can still see through tears

Do not lose heart
The weight of glory is heavier
Though it is unseen

Free your tongue
There is power in a whisper
And love speaks from the gutter

~lg

The afternoon has warmed its beams
And wakened spring from all its dreams
This current is our merry bed
We watch the swans fly overhead

A canopy of feathered white
Encompass us in magic flight
We set a sail for western skies
We watch the dusk around us rise

The feathers turn to falling stars
We are alone and night is ours
The river floats into the moon
Magic births and love will soon

~lg

I first heard this poem by Irish poet Thomas Moore sung as a duet by Hayley Westenra and Méav Ní Mhaolchatha. To me it captures both the sadness and beauty of a change in season and our deep need of companionship in a fragile world.

‘Tis the last rose of summer
Left blooming alone;
All her lovely companions
Are faded and gone;
No flower of her kindred,
No rosebud is nigh,
To reflect back her blushes,
To give sigh for sigh.

I’ll not leave thee, thou lone one!
To pine on the stem;
Since the lovely are sleeping,
Go, sleep thou with them.
Thus kindly I scatter,
Thy leaves o’er the bed,
Where thy mates of the garden
Lie scentless and dead.

So soon may I follow,
When friendships decay,
From Love’s shining circle
The gems drop away.
When true hearts lie withered
And fond ones are flown,
Oh! who would inhabit,
This bleak world alone?

Thomas Moore