Haiku I

the sun rises thrice
through the rhododendron tree
city of windows

A Year of Mornings

Sheets blue and lined by the impressions of raindrops on the window, hardly thick enough to keep out the cold. My skin tingles at the touch of the fabric and warm words whispered by a fleshless voice. Eyes open slowly, faintly; vision touching the walls illuminated by a sun grinning through clouds and rain. I could laugh at the stillness of the air here, behind the windows, when outside the wintry branches wave naked fists in the wind.

The pads of my feet aren’t calloused enough to ignore the spring of grass leaping into the sun. I bury my toes in the sponge of soil, tapping my fingers to the percussion of snapping roots. Looking up, I can’t help but to laugh with the chorus of new growth. Thick air born of bark and budding branches caresses me in a wordless expression of rejoicing and being.

I can trace the lines left behind the lights in the towns below me as they go out. A light here, to the east, goes out just as the hum of electricity bursts in a home, miles west of it – both homes lit by the same lines. Children laugh as fathers tell stories and believe that all is well. I lie in the grass beneath gathering clouds and let my clothes soak up last night’s rain, wondering when the voiceless whisper will speak again.