Shasta Lake by J.R. Dietrich

I am honored to welcome J.R. Dietrich as our guest blogger today.  He is an artist in a multitude of mediums and an incredibly gifted teacher.  He is perhaps most importantly (to me at least) my dad and I love his poem that he chose to share with us today.

"We are told that all creation tells the glory of God...but are we listening?"

Shasta Lake

I

The flutter and flap of the canvas awning echoes the lapping water.

Pines and sweet potato banks light up in the cool sunrise

Rise to the peels and sketch wild blackberries for breakfast

II

Cold night sleeping compasslike

head to the full moon, feet pointing to the big dipper, pondering true north.

You kept me warm last night with the softest down and silk from your youth

III

The wind tugged and poked at my blue shroud

all night till the blue mountains went purple.

The sunrise calmed my fears while my sail luffed gently in the wind

IV

Less breeze, more cold,

the down has slipped and the silk won’t warm

Wake up and fluff the feathers under moonshadows

Interlude

What a surprise to see bats and butterflies

one in the night twilight skies and

the other among the pines.

Mr. redhead sharpbeak

touch of the berry in the garland pine

a little taste of the cardinal thinking cap

your call betrays you

as counterfeit

a summer clown

with snow striped wings you

bob on your air sled

to the next holiday meal.

A helix of six vultures

wingtips transparent in the sun

swoop and lift like the DNA chain of a zephyr

Searching lack of movement

smell of death

black like

their own bodies closing

the chain of life.

V

A man should know the night sky like he should know the phases

of the moon and the constellations as they wander westward following the sun

A man should be able to look into blackness and see the light shining through.

VI

The geese awake me.

A vaporous serpent swallows

Mars and steps over the gibbous moon (she and Venus can not be eaten.) 

A mourning dove murmurs for her mate,

lost now almost a year.

A line of crows (or starlings) rides a current in a single undulating line

then like a waterfall descend into the waking horizon.

A pair of kites silently squabble

then rise to the smiling moon.

VII

The dove again mourns the

waking day and the decay of mystery.

Up the ravine, shadows fall

unveil footsteps of harts.

I follow them to the flat where

goosedown gathers and waterwalkers skate

upon the mirrored lake.

The tumble of water almost drowns out the bees

as they forage among the orange and yellow.

VIII

A lone hummingbird rescued from the fall

now tastes the sweet nectar of sunrise and

two dragonflies become one...