Ascorbic acid tabletswon’t quench my thirst. I want the secret sourcesof the Hudson, log bridges,and vanished paths. Hydrating oil-in-lipstickwon’t cover my hunger. I want countless warm pondswrapped in cold weather. A thin mist. The deep woods. I want freedom. No paper flowers.No fairy tale weddings.No cloned puppies. Just early snow ontumbled rocks, and the fountainheadof majestic streams. […]
nature
Last Virgin Pine
Solitary and heavyunder the unseated saddleof an infinite sky, Immortality is a ruthless harvester of data: an endless string of half breaths from the last remaining virgin pine. Covered in a bright burst of December snowfall, the sunstruck diamonds smile back. George Cassidy Payne is a poet from Rochester, NY. His work has been included in such publications as […]
The Way of Zen
The Way of Zen is to climb the flattest place on earth. To become a geologic paradox. To crack into the earth, like a creative carving of erosion. The way of Zen is when fire meets ice, like a thundering waterfall made quiet by the sacred nature of rocks. This poem was also published in The […]
Getting the most out of summer
Nature’s first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf’s a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf, So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day Nothing gold can stay. – Robert Frost Once you realise this floating life as the perfect mirage of change, […]
Songs of the Ocean’s Tides
Pixie Take a walk on the beach, holding a friend’s hand, and relax. Feel the sand squeezed between your toes and listen to the gently lapping waves. Peaceful, isn’t it? Well, maybe not. Choose a different beach, and the surface might be sharp edges of volcanic rock, a foam frozen in time and cut by […]
Food, Change, and Survival: What the Cockroach Teaches Us
Pixie In 1915, Franz Kafka wrote The Metamorphosis, a novel about a man who woke up one morning transformed into a verminous creature, probably a cockroach. His family is disgusted and repelled by his new form and the rest of the novel is about his struggle to adapt to the change. Why do cockroaches evoke […]
Five Worms – A Preamble
Steve Braff I saved five worms today as they lay plump and limp upon the wet pavement – blind altar of ignominious death by the coming heat or passing car. I saved five worms today as I plucked their slippery bodies stretched supplicant, almost inert from the indifferent asphalt and tossed each to shelter in […]
Descent
Steve Braff The left wing tips down into a lazy bank right above the bilious white cloud skyscrape to the horizon – an immensity that almost eclipses the jagged profile of distant range that Everesting place of the so many aspirants fallen. I stare into that expanse and try to take my measure. Humbled, we fall […]