All You Heroes

The people walk valiantly down the street

Into the rays of the morning sunshine

And they think of themselves as warriors 

Or peasants, the ruling or the oppressed 

They walk into the myths of themselves

With each step they add to their cloak of armor

Or they pull their rags about them

Or they adjust their royal decorations

Each one of them in a different story

Bright moon the last few nights

Washing silver-white all the things—

Trees, streets, fears, sorrows, joys,

Gladness dancing in the light-pools

Alongside grief for the lost boy

The moon illuminates the underneath

All appears upside-down, inside-out

Or perhaps all appears truthfully

Or perhaps all appears obliquely

From the side, the gentle edge

I am not a striving, succeeding human, 

I am a worm in the soil, a leaf on a tree,

A rabbit in the garden, a berry on a bush,

A drop of water in a river from mountain to sea.

I exist yes, but I accomplish only what everything does.

I am not better or worse than you, or her or him;

I am next to everyone in the current as we 

There are councils of animals,

Trees, lichens, all living things 

Gathering in the woods, on the plains,

In the canyons, beside the rivers,

All across all the oceans 

And they are wondering what to do

With us, those creatures who ravage them

Who think the planet is theirs alone

Not the sloth’s, not the salamander’s,

The amanita’s, the ant’s.

I am, still, always, lost in my skin

Trying to construct a human,

Something authentic, real, actual

Whose identity I can touch,

Not this chimerical being of light

That shifts, dies, renews, hides

Resists all attempts to find it,

Define it, make a life with it.

I walk on, a non-being of light

Here, gone, there, gone, here, here.

If we sit here, on this hill,

Watching the sand fill the dunes

The tides erode the cliffs

The birds circling the sun

We will see eternity together

As if we were sharing a dream 

That began at the beginning

And ended where it should,

In this perpetual here-ness.

But perhaps it will be a new hill, 

I stand at the rim of a canyon

The rock walls sheer below me, 

the bottom miles down, the far edge

distant, I couldn’t throw a rock

halfway across. But I must cross.

There is a plague, a monster, an army

Behind me. I can smell the sickness,

Feel the hunger of the beast, hear 

The march of the brigade. And, there is

A treasure on the far rim, not riches, but 

All the years you’ve been gone

Disappear, and you are here.

You look at me with your eternal eyes

And smile your endless smile. 

Your soul is as open as the sea

And you have brought me out to sail,

The hull of me racing across the waves of you.

I know I need you and am free of you,

Both at once. I am free to need you,

I think you are perfect,

Said the crow to his friend.

His friend dipped his head,

Clacked his beak. Why, oh why? He said.

Because your black feathers shine and gleam,

Because you tumble and roll with the wind,

Because you fly beside me every day,

Because you never turn away from me,

Because you can go anywhere, anywhere,