Autumn tells me to put this up....

Aspen

 late afternoon awash in fading gold light

i drive the pass to aspen

instead of limber pine i see a doe

hey i say to the man next to me

but he sleeps on

if i stopped now i would frighten the doe

but ohhh how i long to bound with her

through the pines and know her unfamiliar world

beyond my windshield

and he would still sleep on

he's kind of like a played-out mine these days

surely not the same man

who once orbited the earth in a rocket

my bright and shining star

how could i leave him

i -- whose hands shake like an aspen leaves

at the thought of being alone

the sunlight fades the mountains grow dark

and then amazingly i see falling

through the twilight a glolden ball of fire

hey i say but he merely shifts and snores

and the falling star is gone

lost somewhereburned out in the dusk below

was it a sign that from that vast sky

should flash here and now a meteor

that for an instant is mine alone

i can't shake that thought and i drive

climb independence pass toward its summit

toward the great divide -- and he sleeps on

(c)2008 binnings

In the still dead of night, a fear takes hold,

a suggestion of giving too much, then being left alone.

Time breaks your heart, and you grow cold.

How many times have you yearned to be bold

but afraid the cord will break and drop you with a moan.

In the dead still of night, a fear takes hold.

You travel to the days when they tried to mold

you, dissatisfied with your natural skin and bond.

Time breaks your heart, and you grow cold.

You relieve the threat of getting ironed into the fold

of a cloth without txture, music, or tone.

]In the dead still of night, a fear takes hold.

Night after night, the stories are told

about houses burning that you donât own.

Time breaks your heart, and you grow cold.

You lose sight of the rainbow as the days unfold

counting the minutes you have yet on loan.

In the dead still of night, a fear takes hold.

Time breaks your heart, and you grow cold.

The one thing I understood was that the best thing I could do was to be as healthy as possible to come through the surgery favorably.  It turned into three surgeries . . . and funny how for months afterward, I thought my head would smooth out & feel normal again.  Ha!  Now I know a bumpy head is a little reminder that will always be there, even when my hair has all grown out & covered it up.

My resolution for this year is to grow stronger and more self-sufficient.  I'll hang onto the 2006 resolutions of being as healthy as possible also . that is healthy physically, intellectually, emotionally, spiritually.   I suppose that keeping that health-orientation will help me to fulfill my goals of strength and self-sufficiency. 

Perhaps the greatest lesson of 2006 has been that Nature rules!