The Rising

The clouds flow up the hills like the mist of falls
rising back up to the level they fell from.
I’m making my way down to the hammock in the gazebo.
It’s night, and I toe my way through the grass barefoot,
hoping for no surprises.

Far below, some hombre on a microphone pontificates lakeside.
He could be a circus barker or a kitchen pot salesman
speaking from a booth at a fiesta a mile below.
He seems to be selling something,
but perhaps instead extols the virtues of a bride and groom
or a fifteen-year-old butterfly
emerging from the cocoon of her quiencieñera.

I am deep in the groin of Mexico, swinging under the stars.
Up the hill in my house, the phone chrrrrs insistently
as I retreat from all public noises above and below.
My opening heart  floats  up as I sink deeper under blankets
to watch the clouds rise through moonlight.

I imagine my mother, my husband,
my father, my sister, my friend
and other loves both long and recently departed,
floating in mist above the busy world,
distracted, cushioned by their amazement
at finally rising above voices, gunshots, hospital beds,
screeching brakes, trees, mountains, universes, and their own shells.

How long are they aware of us, the hoi poloi below?
How soon fixed fully on their own rising?

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