I don’t have to know the plan But speak and I’ll go, again. Got my suitcase packed, old journal in my hand. Once, the surface was all I saw, But there's something on the inside going, going on – A mystery I couldn't solve myself, Pouring out of every branch, every cloud, every cell. A hint from the cargo of a sycamore tree (with which a sermon from a songbird did agree) Told me “The difference between the design and the mere fact of a kiss Is why life's happening, and you happen as a part of this”. I was tracing my steps on the Braid river path – It was an old haunt, maybe fodder for a photograph – Thinking, “Why should I dream up anything new?” Then your vocabulary did what I didn't think it would do: Blue, blue, electric blue Like a bolt from the heavens it flew Along came one halcyon, along came two, Heading upstream (countering my downstream route), So I ran, trampling undergrowth in my training shoes, For the fire-catching, kingfishing pair I didn't want to lose, Sprinting for a sighting till I couldn't anymore, and I knew That the track untravelled was the one I’d take to look for you. Catching my breath in the brush and the thorns And my mind's backtracking to the scents of the summer before: Of backpacking with nowhere to lay our heads, Cracking up in Como, so easily led; Back out in Dachau, the aesthetics of inhumanness Got overthrown and overgrown by a blazing garden. Then, grabbing on my vision came these lives so luminous – Dragonflies, drawing little flames from heaven. Yeah, when you speak to me, you know how I'm wired, Where I'm at in my growing, and my heart's desire. But, better than how you make the messages unique, Is how yearningly, burningly, never-spurningly you want to speak. Speak and I'll go! Kingfishers catch fire, and I'll follow. Send me and I'll run Into the great unknown with my laces undone The unknown isn't so uncharted to you. All the miles that I covered - I'd like to think that I grew, Caught in a glimpse of the breadth of the story. When I run right off the map, you're chilling there, waiting for me. Speak and I'll go! Kingfishers catch fire, and I'll follow. Send me and I'll run Into the great unknown with my laces undone.

Here the deities approve - The god of music and of love. All the talents they have lent you, All the blessings they have sent you. Pleased to see what they bestow Live and thrive so well below. Here we get to exhale our inspirations - Here we let them wither in the gloom Or watch them bloom upon the vines we tend Here we scratch out our songs on little stages Scatter pages, sketching out a scene Just guessing what we glean from what the heavens send Pull from that place into this place Find the odd word comes like a kiss placed on the brow – Oh wow, I could sweat for days And never find, never find that honey-dripping phrase Like Mahalia, van Gogh, or Joni… Coltrane, Ursula Le Guin, Antonioni… Pleased to see what comes their way Live and thrive ’til it fades away. Please, let me see – let me see what You bestow Live and thrive, live and thrive on earth below.

My public gets What it wants, but it always wants more You touch my chest With your knuckles like you’re knocking on a door, saying “All you gotta do, my dear, Is show everyone what’s going on in here. All you gotta do,” you said, “Is build the world you see in your head” Everybody wants to know the new direction Hanging out in front of my door, saying “What’s gonna happen?” and I say “Quiet down, quiet down, quiet down, please. Let me listen to the, to the rhythm of the Choirs of, choirs of angels on the FM waves” (There’s a new day coming…) Kids ask me why I’m only listening to long-gone days You’re displaying new layers while you’re staying So beautifully the same Emerald, show what you’re worth Just turn around and let the light disperse. It’s all you gotta do, in fact, For the inspiration to flood right back Everybody wants to know the new direction Hanging out in front of my door, saying “Show me the fashion”. But I’m all “Dial it down, dial it down – oh, please. Your transmission sounds like air conditioning, and We could be, we could be walking on paths the angels paved” (There’s a new day coming… & I do believe it / Lord, let me see it) Everybody wants to know the new direction Hanging out in front of my door, saying “What’s gonna happen?” and I say “Quiet down, quiet down, quiet down, please. Let me listen to the, to the wisdom of Donny on ‘Some Day We’ll All Be Free’ I mightn’t see it but I, I do believe it Look away, look away from those screens. Got free admission to innervisions of a Better way, so break away, little heart – be brave”

Sorry to interrupt your reverie – Look at the light on that patch of green Let in the actuality of air I'm stopping the clock – take a walk out there Are you alone in grass overgrown? Honey, it’s somebody’s home Walk long and walk free, and I'll wager you'll see There’s an earth that’s going about its own thing… That river rolls on, and wings awaken the dawn Listen ’til you can’t refuse it – Maybe all of this is music. A tortoiseshell flies – there were more when I was a child, Emperors arrayed in purple Pretty little wings encircle you While a change comes on in their cocoons People, we all have a job to do. What are the gifts you’re giving to everything living? As the harmony grows, feel it healing your bones. Let the rocks stop crying/our songs start realigning… That river rolls on, some friends are already gone Got to keep open-hearted, Admirals arrayed in scarlet See cyclamen grow, hear crickets in the meadow (They’re) actors in the ecosystem – People, we are right there with them Come evening, the constellations all sing Worlds that I cannot imagine Twirling through a cosmic pageant If all of these things – their life, their delicate wings – Pull upon your heart like magnets, Maybe all of this is magic, too.

It’s a quiet Saturday morning. And, looking from This third-floor window, my first sight of things alive Shows me five/six goldfinches arriving, squadron-like In darts of lucid colour in our grown-together trees. Heads of fire-engine red, like they've pecked through the tops of paint pots, Their call more gossipy than such an elegant appearance might suggest. Maybe my attention’s been captured by things of feather, flight and bone. Or maybe there's some other realm, just behind what's visible So over-full with beauty that The balance of the whole shebang would be upset If strikingly beautiful creatures did not erupt into being, And furnish earth’s undersea, or hop and flit in my garden. So in my garden, they hop and flit. And suddenly I see this group scatter like a firework, Firing finches outwards at speed from a centre-point. As suddenly again, they're back where they started Studying each other and exploring their leafless paths. Their vividness, and silent, surprising motion, Their lax adherence to the laws of physics (as I perceive them) All remind me of the cloud of dust from Redding A few years back. Remember? where the silvery specks would swoop And swirl above our heads in the low-lit building. One moment stately, one moment playful, They would swell, and sometimes fall on us. Sometimes rise to the ceiling. Then would pass out of sight, Would grab our collective breath again by bursting Like a firework. As if some pyrotechnic artist, just behind everything, had such an excess of colours on their fiery palette That the balance of this whole shebang would be upset If strikingly beautiful things did not erupt into being, And furnish our field of vision.

How long, o Lord, ’til we see justice on earth? I’ve just been sitting on my suitcase making rhymes. Help me be a blessing, ’stead of bewailing the times. Will you send me to the hummingbird shore? There’re beasts there that’ve never been seen before; Or fly me out to Californ-i-a? Even dreams dream dreams there (or so they say); Or plant me back upon the old north coast, Get that Portstewart sand in between my toes? Don’t need to be a legend – Push me out like a fledgling From the sunny mountainside on a one-way flight. I cast my vote – Napoleon’s still running the farm. If I speak, let me speak like his time is short – If his thought police are buggin’, hope there’s somethin’ to report. I saw a miracle and life didn’t change Cause I never lived differently the next day We’ll make a path – make it prayer by prayer Get my hands dirty here. Good as anywhere. The next corner that I turn around, There’ll be growth, grief and glory there to be found… That tree is charged with redwings. Push me out like a fledgling From the sunny mountainside on a one-way flight.