by Patrice M. Wilson
You could say I was dead, all the memories of the sun glinting like hope through branches of trees and the beauty of the desert moon hanging on invisible strings like my spirit hovering above me somewhere in the sky. I don’t know what touched me— some wisp of breath from the songs of children or the March wind urging its way through the room making it breathe and sing too. Or perhaps the foglike rain in the valley, hiding the mountains like a veil that covers a beautiful woman’s face whose eyes shine out and in moving left to right conjure new life to touch future dawns into whatever there is of mind in this universe, of heartbeat, of shiver stirring in the body, of a glimpse of warmth that makes for the inherent comfort of life, no matter how faint or far off, no matter the inevitable ache of death, no matter if that glimpse happens the next morning or not. But some morning. Any morning. Soon.
Previously published in her print book, Hues of Darkness, Hues of Light, which is available at eLectio Press and Amazon.com online.
Born Catholic in Newark NJ, raised in Catholic schools, Patrice M. Wilson has a PhD in English from the University of Hawaii at Manoa, having earned her MA there and her BA at the University of Maryland, College Park. She was editor of the very fine Hawaii Pacific Review for 16 years while teaching at Hawaii Pacific University. She has three chapbooks of poetry with Finishing Line Press, and one full-length poetry collection with Christian publisher eLectio Publishing. Dr. Wilson recently spent five years in the cloistered Carmelite monastery in Kaneohe, HI. She is now a retired professor living in Mililani, Oahu, HI.