With the Sun Caught in a Net of Pines

With the sun caught in a net of pines
dusk released like an aroma
calming the mountain pond we dangled our toes in.
All around us, arms of green mountains caressing
and the blips and blops of trout
rising to gulp in the mayflies of early summer.

This is a real place.
I was consumed by that,
awed by that.
There, trees leaned on each other like calligraphy against the horizon's light.
Here, tadpoles swished their feathery tails, huge and swelling into full frogs.
We, barefoot, lying on a moss covered rock.

We will grow asparagus in patches around our big country yard
push spades into mountain earth
make mounds and trenches and rows of growing things.
We will grow.
We will grow into anything we want to become—into a family, into a life,
into whatever it is that happens to us
when our breath has passed and the light has stopped.

Talking between silences, we find silence is our muse,
the quiet time that two people can have.
It is what we use all our words for when it is gone.
It is what we need only to close our lips to have.