Lesley-Anne Evans

POET + COMMUNITY ARTIST

creator | facilitator | friend

Lament of Water

I.

Snow this morning
after several days of deep freeze.
Slow flakes freed from sky
lay themselves at earth’s feet:
So much emptying.

I would love to live like a river flows…

II.

This time of year the creek
is crusted, flow invisible to passersby
and their dogs, but I hear her speak.
She will transport continents
at spring break-up, downed trees,
bloated islands of animals;
the elders, the dying.

…carried by the surprise of its own unfolding. 

III.

I sit in my windowed room while the sun
peels back morning, each snowflake
whispers earth as in heaven.
Each day and its relentless giving,

I would love to live…

I do not ask yet I receive what
I do not know I need.  Such gifts
of shadow and of blinding light;
how much longer, LORD.

Lines from John O’Donohue’s Unfinished Poem