I take it in,
The sun’s final, desperate burst of glory
Cascading colors dripping
into my ink-black pupils
The ethereal flames bleed away
As I, too, return to darkness
I awoke,
But the darkness never departed
Yet I felt warmth return
through a thousand small and eager mouths
And I yearned, I stretched,
and the light made a home of me
Ring by ring
Year by year,
as my coat waxed and waned,
From a deep, entrancing green
To a fiery Red, until the red became more than color
And a heat moved through me
Unlike the gentle bask I have become accustomed to
I had held the light
Until I had become its embodiment
And in a flash of brilliance
I returned as ash
to the eagerly awaiting earth
I awoke,
Weightless,
The darkness retreated
And came in its stead,
a supernatural clarity,
Again, I yearned, and I stretched
Reaching for my old friend,
And I shot straight towards his scorching embrace
I rode the golden columns of light,
Twisting, turning,
Feeling the warmth ripple through my dazzling plumage.
Below, a small break in the green
A small figure, upturned
I circled closer, the wondrous brightness in the eyes
Jolted a memory of the past,
and I dropped lower than I should have,
and he laughed a sudden, liberating laugh
and held his open hand up toward me
like something he had always known to do
and could not say why.
You were never passing through.
You are the land, dreaming itself awake.
You have always been here,
wearing different faces,
wondering where you came from.