poet laureate

[Chris Weaver]

may my blood find the courage to flow again.
may the earth again rise shaped by warm, tender hands.
may we lay in cool grasses telling our stories,
while children run laughing in circles around us.

(thank you, jeff)

LAUGHING IN CIRCLES

We circled for a meeting of grown-ups
on the patio.  Aidan, four years old,

with rubber ball, markers, pad of paper
had all the space around us for his play.

First thing he did: he dragged a folding chair
across the stones and wedged it among ours.

A place for him (he had no intention,
of course, to sit there).  Bounced his ball a while,

then tiptoed over, handed it to each
of us in turn, clockwise, for us to toss

and him to chase, like a dog but silent,
so patient as we talked our grown-up talk.

Then belly-down he drew pictures, rolled them,
laid one under each chair like a snowflake.

Oh, do not forget them!

Oh, do not forget them, be they thirteen
or seven, four or one.  You be the loom,

the walls, the ground.  They are the very thread
of Spirit, and no one has to teach them

how to weave, or when, or why.


Chris Weaver
Swannanoa, North Carolina, USA
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