tea time

the winter sun strained
through bare branches

back among familiar trees

my shadow
stretches out

a woodpecker’s
urgent knocks

in the bare sycamores
evening sun

56 years later
with heron legs

to the mountain
its hiking stick

on an empty stomach
trying not to stare

the falling snowflakes
one brown leaf

I was trying to find another world. It was right here all along.

hunter’s cap
a bell-like sound
from the raven’s throat

of the wolf
mother tree

the mountain cut open
by a new road

you too
have never existed