nature of contact

beautiful cold
wraps my Californization,
frosty to freeze pipes
unusual here in Paradise
I layer thick under wool sweaters
because I'm skinny and new to myself,
staying warm is outside
my routine,
a new visitor from an east coast past
of childhood snowbanks
and red-faced frozen
sled adventures

pale florescent light
fills the cool room,
the cluttered desk
a still life
of stationery and
a few plastic bottles,
sticky notes with sleepy numbers
crusted bike gloves
small dusty vitamin bottle
a cut-out drawing of two purple flowers

a place,
a window on disparate lives of friends
threaded through mine
in tension of four dimensions
but cradled in the rough palms
of old longshoremen
and grandmothers crocheting
(these are the keepers of our lives
the pillars of hope,
those who carry us in tired
uncertain times)

how can my heart move out
through these streaming bits of colored light
and be touched from afar?
overcome by connections,
the warmth is wave after wave
of us doing what's important to us -
we can dig deep and share the treasures
anthracite in times of bituminous glut
gold in times of pyrite glitter
oak in times of soft pine
keeping on sharing the truth of what we find