I
Dream weave: green cloth cascading from her shoulders
and pooling at her feet creates a zone
of ceremony, safety, and renewal.
We found ourselves on a park bench at noon.
The day was blue. Low sun
gilded the river, angled through the trees.
Too soon for green. And yet
dream…green…vaccine?
Even the idea of vaccinations
(closer; still out of reach)
was pulling us away
from that one hour, one January day
toward a future still too dim to see.
Something had to be
blocking the faint gleam
at the end of the proverbial tunnel,
poking its massive head into that patch
of barely visible and precious light.
II
And all the while, ruthless, merciful,
time keeps on going – trudges, races, flows,
tends and trends toward endings or beginnings,
depending on what we desire or fear
or how we gauge the distance in between
what’s longed for and what’s seen.
Each day now the light
lasts a bit longer than the day before.
Each hour moves us closer to the end
of the nightmare tunnel four years long,
closer to where we hope to shoulder past
the death’s head and emerge,
gulp a deep breath of air, survey the new
changed and expanded view.
Dream weave. Green mantle.
Ceremony, safety, and renewal.
The sky is blue,
high silver clouds and sunlight breaking through.