A Meditation on the South
South, welcome me now into your warm and passionate embrace.
Show me heat and light and a fragrant flowering of life I'd nearly forgotten was possible,
That stirs in my breast and murmurs softly of new beginnings.
Renaissance now welling up, death of then, birth of now.
What shall we make this day? say the gods within.
Answering green shoots, the serenade of songbirds, old songs renewed,
New buds and blossoms singing, too, of shiny, new creation
Reflected in glossy eyes of tadpoles yearning to leap in air.
Then summer sun shimmers, summoning flower, fruit and berry,
Ancient maize rockets skyward in gold and green abundance,
Entwined with delicate sisters whose corkscrew tendrils
Worship sun with offerings of squash, beans, morning glories, too.
O South, how can we forget your hard lessons of death and resurrection?
You are miraculous fire, destroyer and purifier, razing and raising.
The fury of forest blaze and hot flashes of human violence
Bursting open dormant seeds and releasing the Phoenix of greenest hope.
I look longingly into the passionate blue-green eyes of summer,
Feeling the fury of hot light penetrating my bare skin,
Burning away the withered vines that bind love and choke joy.
Purge my wintery soul with fire, and forge for me a new and tender heart.
Show me heat and light and a fragrant flowering of life I'd nearly forgotten was possible,
That stirs in my breast and murmurs softly of new beginnings.
Renaissance now welling up, death of then, birth of now.
What shall we make this day? say the gods within.
Answering green shoots, the serenade of songbirds, old songs renewed,
New buds and blossoms singing, too, of shiny, new creation
Reflected in glossy eyes of tadpoles yearning to leap in air.
Then summer sun shimmers, summoning flower, fruit and berry,
Ancient maize rockets skyward in gold and green abundance,
Entwined with delicate sisters whose corkscrew tendrils
Worship sun with offerings of squash, beans, morning glories, too.
O South, how can we forget your hard lessons of death and resurrection?
You are miraculous fire, destroyer and purifier, razing and raising.
The fury of forest blaze and hot flashes of human violence
Bursting open dormant seeds and releasing the Phoenix of greenest hope.
I look longingly into the passionate blue-green eyes of summer,
Feeling the fury of hot light penetrating my bare skin,
Burning away the withered vines that bind love and choke joy.
Purge my wintery soul with fire, and forge for me a new and tender heart.
