Charles Rightmire
2227 Spruce Street
Billings, MT 59101
Some people, I think, do not like life,
except their own and, perhaps, their neighbor's.
All else is other, and sometimes,
they wonder about the neighbors.
Their tree, their dog, their child
move in wondrous ways,
all the rest is out to get me.
It's not paranoia when they really are.
Darkness lies in the other,
a survivor of ourselves, perhaps.
Such humans do not regret
the chopped down maple or miss its shade,
or ask forgiveness of the dying buffalo.
The tree's death, the buffalo death
does not diminish them.
My neighbor's soul isn't mine,
but it can lie with mine
like two big cats stretched
along the branch that extends into our yards.
The dust in the sun beam, I think,
the veins of a leaf are strong.
The needle of a pine scratches my arms
as do the claws of the feral cat.
I feel them both, yet life is shaded.
It rises in pulses
--and impulses--within universal
symbols creating particles
that build an atom, sharing energy
that shapes the particles.
I have sat at tables and realized
that I have lived the experiences of trees,
and of yellow faces, black and red.
Our scars are too alike.
I have seen the laughter and the tears,
the shapes--we all get wrinkles beside
our noses and in our foreheads
that crack when we laugh--or cry.
I once thought they were badges of honor.
We have to work hard to create
differences when the other
forms a part of us.
We still have children with each other
after millennia of separation.
My God, what would we do
to green men from the stars
who came as friends?