Pearls at the Outpost

Here's where a poem starts for me, a bit of reading and observing and then little scribblings in my commonplace book, maybe a sketch or two.

I was reading in the book of Micah, visiting with my red Jeep friend Leslie, and taking in the New Mexico landscape. I was trying to listen too, to the quiet and words on the wind. Here is one poem from my trip to Red River.

The Outpost

I’ve been to a storied place,
After thirty summers
It was new to me
Perched in the sparkling aspens
Silvered bark blooming scars
She winked from one dormer eye
Smiles in a screen door
Popcorn clouds in a Pueblo sky

We are old friends back together
Talking soul deep
Among Paul Bunyan woodpiles
And found feather bouquets
Hummingbirds to the sugar
Pouring words ruby red
Into a handmade log cabin
Invisible bats hang overhead

In the land of red willows
Red Jeep friendship takes the hill
Life is notched on the measuring board
Saved from another house
Watered here to grow
Under laughing aspens
Nestled in beauty and pain
Tears heal the heart
Where Alyson carved her name

I’m leaving through the horseshoes
Past the birdhouse cherry red
Better for the time to unwind,
Saying prayers on the middle bridge
Writing poetry out of heart
Remembering things Red River said,
"What a great time to be a girl."
"We just need a little elbow room."
Songs from an Oklahoma pearl

I'll be stringing these pearls for a while and smiling as I do.

I'm taking "What a great time to be a girl" right into my prayers for Baby Girl.

By the way, I took the graffiti photo in the banner above underneath a bridge over the muddy Rio Grande in New Mexico. Life is beautiful! You never know what you'll find or where you'll find it. That's another pearl for Baby Girl.