This night is meant
for wandering
when hazy moon
drifts by and reaches in
to shake me
by surprise
she hovers at my window
there
bestirring me for company
and thus beseeched
I must oblige
arise she croons
and thence go I
barefooted soul
a hooded naif
I now belong to her
an eager child
I tread her wake
give up
chides she
all earthly care
the binds of humankind
and thrash your branchy arms
and throw your shadow high
climb up
up
these nights are solely
meant for we
these skies that whisk us
wayward wide
and tug our anchored core
we are not tree
connected fast
and rooted firm
stray free the grounding ties
unloose
uncurl
allow
the travelers life
we choose tonight
four winds shall bear us
soft and fleet
we'll set the sail
no chart nor will
and rudderless
we'll man the prow
as stars salt down
around us now

Sara Mathews     December 2022

 

On waking I believe
A careless wind has swept my thoughts
away
I had a dream of nice and warm
to get me through the
day
but wind had else in mind for
me
she wrested words for fun
and whirled them high
and ruffled them
and all the letters came
undone
and now I chase them here and
there
they scatter deftly through the
air
and run amok beneath the trees
and sweep the walk and rush the
leaves
and what is left
but sit
and stare
and
breathe

Sara Mathews     November 2022

Artwork ~ Kiyoshi Nakajima

 

I'm sorry for hogging
the top of the tree
but that's where I sit
if you look all around
there are other tall trees
but this one's not it
I am taller than tall
I can see all of all
from the length of my eye
and the width of my wing
I can understand earthlings
and sky-lings
and things
it should not be so hard
from this vantage I hold
if we cherished our vision
of blue green and gold
of the peace of the meadow
the rippling sea
the calm of the mountains
the strength of each tree
I can't give up my perch
but a neighbor you'd be
if you sat at the top
of the tree next to me
you would know what I know
at the crest of the world
if you nurtured your earth place
as would any bird
you would hold it to heart
you would understand all
if you'd just find a tree
that is taller than tall

Sara Mathews   July 2022
Photograph ~ Ingrid Mathews

 

Sometimes
the world
stops
the wind stops
the birds
stop
it's a pin drop
day
and I
will lose myself
and walk into the silence
until
my feet stop
until my mind lies down
amid the quiet
flowers
and the healing earth
has hidden me
and swaddled me
in hues of
noiseless color
and there I'll stay
until
the world
recovers

Sara Mathews     June 2022

Artwork ~ Duy Huynh (used with permission)

https://www.duyhuynh.com/duy-huynh-artwork/

 

the birds still sing
when I am at a loss
when news is grim
and day begins in every land
of peace and war
and stories that one
can't ignore
but yet cannot take in
the birds still sing
when right is muddled
into wrong
and hate and violence
grow strong
and selfless voices fade
and goodness too
the birds begin each day
anew
with hope
they pray in song
they sing

Sara Mathews ~ May 2022

 

One sky begins

one eye opens

gradually admitting in

the day

one morning calls arise

a new sun brims

one eye open too for him

a hesitating mind we share

what lingerings

or worries have we brought

what hazy thought

of yesterday

or dreams that shadow he and me

We sort the nagging cumulus

the ones we can control

these we can

those we can't

could we reform

a world reborn

the sky is pretty

oyster grey

a peaceful dove

and yet too soft

exposing us

an underbelly to the prey

We breathe our affirmations in

blue sky

blue sky

We breathe our anxious clouds away

blue sky

Sara Mathews      March 2022
Artwork ~ Duy Huynh https://www.duyhuynh.com

 

you rose at last
so round
so full
with lolling face
lopsided smile
you rolled from eider cloud
appearing somewhat tipsy
if I may
a bit dismayed
perhaps
with your own self
in all your beauty
a luminous display of revelry
and though I thought
I knew you well
most every night
in every phase
this drunken you
was new
oh this is most disorderly
to be so new and full
the same
before the calendar can
name just who and when
and where
and chart your every move
confusing me
amok you went
and bent the world
like it was your affair
was it February
that satisfied you so
the perfect haze to burgeon
then the smoothest night to trawl
across an icy sky
a snowbound earth
aglow below
reflecting high
your pie-eyed gaze
to join you on your
bender too
to traipse
a wayward
errant
grinning
clearly sideways
most intoxicating
night with you

Sara Mathews     March 2022

Artwork ~ Baljeet Panaiche

Good evening moon
You’re looking much like me
Or I like you 
Might be the case
A winter face we share tonight
Same shape
Same wan expression 
Same fair to middling phase
We climb together through the cloud
My mind as high as yours
My feet still to the ground 
A curious night 
We idle in 
Surveying all the middling sights
The quiet stars
So taciturn 
The trees are hushed
No raucous bird
The not too hot
The not too cold
No rain or snow to blur the eye
No restlessness
Or scuttling  
The wind is busy somewhere else
No heavy mist
Or leaden fog
Just me the earth and you the sky
And so we share the evening thus
Until it’s time to bid goodbye 

Sara Mathews     January 2022

The wind woke me up 
Last night
Sleepless and needy
She rattled my window
She banged at my door
She wished for my company
Why
I’m not sure 
The moon kept me up then
So full of the days
She saw me awake 
And she needed a cry
The tears with the wind
Was a wintry mix
So I brought them both in
And I fixed them some tea
And I sat them both down
For a bit of a chat
And I soothed them 
And calmed them ‘cause 
I am like that
Then I ushered them out
With some very wise words
As I wondered how they were 
In charge of the world?!

Sara Mathews     January 2022

I wished for such a storm
All night through
I rose at every hour
Hoping 
One am praying
2 am calm as calm 
At 4 am no messenger of snow
And so I slept a skeptic then
A bit let down by weathermen
But oh to my surprise
My waking eyes beheld  
Just such a day
And here I sit upon my pillow ship
Quite mesmerized
I watch the other sailors though
They’re shoveling with all their might
Like they are in control 
I laugh like I’m the wind
I want them to stay feathered in
Like me
To sit all morning long
And watch the show
The complexities
The intricate 
Oh see the flakes blow East
Now West
Then sidewise as they curl
Again and eddy round 
A polar dance
And listen to the winter wail
The wild waves of winter song
In octaves high and low
But off they go with shovels raised
They want to keep the storm at bay
I will the wind ‘sweep them away’
So I may be alone 
This blizzard then is just for me
This squall my glorious sea 
And since I’m captain of this ship
I’ll navigate quite malleably
And go 

Wherever this storm blows

Sara Mathews     January 2022

Guess what I saw

When I looked around
I saw a leaf come floating down
To spin a graceful spinning sound
And land at the feet
Of it’s roots spread wide
And a little door that peeked inside
To a tiny face with squirrelly eyes
And in the upper realms I saw
A handmade home
All knit with sticks
And there it rocked within the tree
In arms that held it lovingly  
I found the sun
A blade of grass
I felt a breath of wind pant past
And there a house 
All made of brick
It’s walls extremely straight and thick
A sidewalk made for me to walk
A sky that blued up to the top
A feathered flock 
That flew as one
A woolen crop of gathered cloud 
A pebble polished true 
And round 
All this I saw in just one day 
It’s truly most extraordinary

Sara Mathews     January 2022

Good morning Mr Grey
You’re looking extra glum 
Your overcoat is dour
Your mood is clearly heavy
A bit hung over
One might say
You slog along and whimper
How you didn’t sleep last night
The moon was just too bright
And now you roll the mists around
And draw the gloomy curtains down
But little do you know
That I don’t care
I crave these glowering faces
Your melancholy ways
Intoxicate my brain
I’d like to cheer you
If I could
But rather I will dress like you
And sulk around the neighborhood

Emoting melodrama too!

Sara Mathews     January 2022

Oh reckless wind
You buffeted my sleep again
You shook my psyche 
Loosing all the bolts
The fire and ice
Both rampaged 
Then
And chased me through 
The night
No letup would you bear
But truth
And truth to spare
And only hope of morning
To repair 

Sara Mathews     January 2022

 

I’m waiting for the storm
You promised ice
That music that I love
Tap tap against the morn
You promised snow
A dizzying sky
The flakes so big and round
A wind so fast and wild
That one is carried North
Upon the sound
I’m stubborn in my bed
I wait for all that you declared
Would be my waking scene
But lo
No blizzard roars
No maelstrom worried skies
No bluster at the pane
No tempest at my door
And sadly thus
I must get going on the day

Sara Mathews     January 2022

Artwork ~ Viktor Mikhailovich Vasnetsov

A dance in a dream
We have become
Perhaps our baby wings
Are out for reconditioning
I’ve heard of it
They come back goldenly refit
We’ll need them when the party’s done
For now we’ll twirl on ballerina toes
If we spin fast enough
We’ll get a rise
A little floating lift
And we can pirouette around the town
And through the days
And wear a glittery haze
An ephemeral winged crown
For in our feet we hold the memory
Of how it feels to fly
And in our arms 
We hold our remnant feathers tenderly
And practice leaping at the sky

Sara Mathews     January 2022

Artwork ~ Jennifer Mujezinovic

When I was a child
I could fly
It’s long ago now
Sometimes in a dream
I’ll know of it
The way it felt
To lift away from roads
Of trouble
A little effort at the first
Ungraceful like a goose
But once I felt my feet
Depart
Accomplishing a bit of air
Beneath my measly bones
Of wing
Then suddenly I was expert
At my flight
Untethered and untired
I could soar the sky
Not ever in the clouds
But more a treetop skimming fly
To stay connected to the grounded
Hearts I knew
And never would I leave
Except for proving
That I could
But now with age to weight me
All the lessons I’ve accrued
I’ve lost the stamina to separate
From earth
Perhaps until the time I should
But in the furthest recess
Of my childhood mind
I try 
To sift the memory out
To dust it from the moths
Of years
And hope to then reclaim 
What growing old
And growing up 
Forgot

Sara Mathews     January 2022

Artwork ~ Duy Huynh 

https://www.duyhuynh.com