The Difference Between Vespers and Whispers

1

The tree in March is fruit-white--
it will be green with pear in summer.

Nearby the apple tree is leafy green, open.
Petunia pinks are pomegranate small
seeds in the flakey green.

2

Saturday midday sun white and glares from my truck.
I know the people only by their cars.
We move in parallel on narrow dirty roads.
Gaps close between us, and I see
my neighbors, cast in shadow,
raise their hands to pass, to wave.

3

I heard the story of a nun,
stripped of black robes and band of gold,
laid in white cotton, stark relief
in a hospital bed,
surrounded by priests and sisters.
When the old nun died, she raised her arms from her sides,
to summon Christ, she lifted hands from the bed
to wave, to praise, to greet Him.

4

Maybe it's all cloud perception
the way the night air seems thick
and even the moon appears to be smoking.
The trees stand heavy, hold their limbs
low in the dark gray sky.

Not like the evening two weeks ago.
I stood on the deck, clear air, the turquoise-indigo sky
stretched tight like a wide ribbon
blue backdrop for the tress.
Towering, immense, spiders without leaves,
one by one, I watched them thrust their limbs high,
arm after arm of them, black in the forest,
they were waving, waving at me, all of them,
fingertips of branches
pressed against the bottom of the sky.