Wildfire of Hope

Hope takes us entirely out of this world while we remain bodily in the midst of it. Our minds retain their clear views of what is good in creatures. Our wills remain chaste and solitary in the midst of all created beauty...

                                                                      Thomas Merton   No Man Is An Island

                                    The black raspberries are beading
                                    the edges of the fields

                                    with dark clusters
                                    presenting themselves

                                    for the taking
                                    into our hands and mouths

                                    staining our soft flesh
                                    into shades of morning

                                    dropping between lucent leaves
                                    and all the too heavy

                                    falling into the shapeless
                                    loss of summer sweetness

                                    that lie in the cool and dark
                                    beneath the light skimming

                                    like swallows
                                    over the grasses of prayer

                                    and the wildfire of hope 
                                    within the scattering seeds.