Window Poems

Kenya to Kentucky, an ode to Wendell Berry

David S.

Outside is the Darkness

Outside is the darkness,
in the darkness the rain falls heavy,
cascading across the road,
washing out trenches
on its way to the stream,
gathering steam
to thunder down paradise falls,
on to flood and feed the valley

In the darkness, in the waterfalls,
freshwater crabs search for food in gathering pools.
Colobus huddle silently in the trees above,
white tails waterlogged in the heavy,
moonless night,
waiting to wake the dawn with bullfrog croaks,
but now is the time of stillness.

The leopard and her cubs take cover from the storm,
maybe in a tree,
maybe in the cleft or a rock. . .
secret, wherever they are.

Above, the sound of the late flight approaching Nairobi,
a reminder not all is wild here.