I felt some fluff on a grey stalk

Held it with awakened fingers

Only to find moisture there, a

Soft vibration of aliveness

I did not expect

And deeper noticing

I had misplaced somewhere

I stepped further down the path, out into the field

Explored its perimeter

Til there

Out of all the others…

A Queen Anne’s cluster

The tiny faded hand on brittle limb

Her own dry, grey fingers extended as if in suspended longing

Joined together at the wrist

Not long ago pulsing with life to the roots

Now a constellation of dried stars

And another

More

All finding their connection

At a single stem, that

Complex umbilicus

Of growth enticing nourishment

Yes, life rises up and courses downward to the Mother

Sipped sweetly through the channel

That invited these star beings to the sky

I gently bend the first small universe

Towards my large brown eyes

Curious heart expecting a bed of dried up

Once-was life

Yet within

Resting safely

Gleaming iridescent

A small dark creature in its hard onyx shell

Offering its surrender

Ah, the winter’s sun

And gossamer curtains draped across a bright blue sky

Life is all around you, she seems to say

My friend…you need only witness

You already hold everything you need

Tiny Constellations