Balsam-filtered sun
aspen-mantled
touches
layered forest floor
grounded stick
night gaze
fixed
shining spheres
shouldered
upon
forked maple
perched

Like feathers silent as a wing, a staff finds my hand for the crossing from known to unknown. I, on hands and knees lost in complexity while another intelligence looks down, puzzled.

At night in my ordered room I like awake in peace ... just knowing it is near.

The more I think, the less I feel
less I feel, harder I try
worse it goes, why oh why
is such a simple thing
prone to complication?

Stop chopping, start breathing,
free the mind to find
nerve and muscle aligned
in a swing of automation.

"Don't try to beat the skin off the ball," the old pro would say, holding a seven iron like a wizard's staff. "Okay, I'll try Dad." Eventually it would come, that effortless thing, that swing ... with its sweet sound of simple.