mixed blessing

for ubiquitous service to humanity

electricity’s motors, fans, engines

rightly claim kudos for our comfort

but how much of Nature’s

whispered music is muffled and lost?

for our presumed safety from attack

night lights, streetlights, guard lights

leaks upward toward the night sky

blanching our view of the beauty of stars

our awareness of galaxies, vast distance

and time

senior living

come to die here

in comfort and elegance

as much as possible given

reality

struck as i walked north

toward large window

at the end of the corridor

with reflected parallel

rows of light leading upward

toward the blue purple

hills

as though toward

heaven

break in the indigo-purple

break in the indigo-purple

layers of hinting-dawn clouds

steely gray horizon blushing

with the promise of another day

dreamed mountains of color and time

dreams in the night of mountains

snaggle-toothed and gray with

the mixing of complementary colors

eerie of purple muted in yellow

blue warmed by sunshine orange

earthy with flora and fauna

green and red, tinted by generations

of life and reprocessing of minerals

upheavals from depths and layers

of existences over eons

mountains explaining time

as we seldom pause to comprehend

except in dreams where busy-ness

at times distorts back toward reality

indoor-outdoor

images of grazing deer reflected on inane mystery

playing on my television screen remind me

there is more to learn and love in my yard

than on my idiot box

.