The Felt Voice
of Land

"And we desire to see the world intact, to step outside our emptiness and remember the strong currents that pass between humans and the rest of nature, currents that are the felt voice of land, heard in the cells of the body." – Linda Hogan, from "Creations"












Olbrich by Night



Now by 5:45 on the way to a class at Olbrich
all of the clatter of the streets has quieted
to the softer sounds of cold bike tires
or the dog-walkers crunching stiff ice
the entire miasma of colors have ceded
to simple lightless slate off the faces of houses
where from some smoke lifts gray to gray
and somehow dampens the siren of ambulance
along the capital end of East Washington Street
and I feel I am of two persons at the moment
the one who had wished away the days' busy hours
filled by fingertips of keyboard tasks
and now the other who has found friend night again
the lake quietly awake in its corner of the watershed
reflecting white piers of lights from apartment buildings
the shoreline trees themselves speak of permanence
brush strokes lifted over the pages of beaches
the last seagulls bobbing white candles
who will tomorrow leap up from the water
and follow clouds blindly beautifully south
holding the voice of the teacher again