Under a Full Moon at Midnight

This is a paean to relief and ecstasy.

A man's poem of course—the electric ah!

in the long stream arcing a rainbow

under the spotlight moon, a covenant between

mv body and the earth's.

I think of Li Po smiling

silently on Green Mountain and can hear Rumi

drunk on rapture—drink my brother he calls to me,

think of the elephant loosening a great ebullient

stream that floats a river past your house and drop

turds so immense you could build a hut from them

along the shore to shelter your children.

What release!

Think of your child pedaling under your hand

and of a sudden—it just happens—you let go

and he's off on his own, free for that first time—

the achieve of, the mastery of the child.

See the stalwart trees in their silence

the stones resting in the driveway, the cat curled asleep

on the front porch, the smear of blood

on the lion's mouth sitting over his fresh gazelle

the morning paper and its stories shouting

for attention. The plenitude of it all.

And perhaps

somewhere a friend is dreaming of me, or someone

a stranger is peeing ecstatic under the same moon.

A covenant then between us.

True or not. It is no matter.