by Ethel Mortenson Davis
The piñons
have become brittle
in this dry desert heat.
How I yearn
for the sound of water—
a sound of rain
running in rivulets
and then into fast
moving streams,
finally joining
the rushing rivers.
How I’ve yearned
for the blue-green arms
of Lake Superior
to hold me again
with its disordered forests,
with every kind
of fern and moss
dotting its shoreline.
But the giant piñon,
in its fluid dance
toward the sky,
twists and turns
into the deepest
part of us
and gives peace
to our psyches.
The chaos of nature
brings the mind
to order—
the unplanned spacings
of land and water,
wilderness,
keeps the soul
from flying apart.
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