Doris Lynch

12 Steps on the Path to Solitude

1. The crowd gathers over there, over there.

2. Sometimes a single hawk punctuates the blue.

3. Other times solitude creates a carapace for one too thick to slice apart.

4. Sounds travel through it, especially laughter.

5. Entering it is like skydiving, you're never sure your parachute will unfurl.

6. It's best experienced on a mountain peak.

7. Choose dawn or dusk or one of those hours when the stars wow you.

8. Animals never interrupt except those gifted with sign language.

9. Ignore crows when they mock it, as they surely will. Jealous corvids.

10. At night the living and the dead both invade it. Forgive their intrusions.

11. When walking in the woods alone, accept the spiderweb's embrace.

12. Only when you're deep inside it, can you taste the sky on wind, thread voices apart with your tongue, long for the sway & bustle of your tribe moving as one.

above Griffy Lake
the last goose
sputters into sky