Oh

This is so good;

sensual joy

from nerve ends conspiring

to sing their rhythms

in vital comfort

— not blanket or escape,

deep quiver of raw freshness.

All is well,

even here on the charred planet,

soft couch, memory of torment

in the eye of a storm

still raging.

This grin is not wild crazy,

it spills from softness

as if the earth

needed my feet

through which to grow smiles upwards.

Of course we belong,

we be-longing and belonging,

there is no other universe

we dropped from;

this is home,

our cells are bound here.

Carbon and oxygen entwined

in the deep pleasure of this skin

and all that roils beneath it,

and then molecular unbinding

as they dance in new pairings

and I cease.

And maybe you don’t see why

I hang the rearview mirror at this odd angle,

sideways glimpse of happy

living in tragic,

but every now and then

I also get to see the bright flash

of my own delight

as it moves through this aging body,

young and sexy,

aching and replenished,

morose and exultant.

And in that bright shining

the trees and my neighbours

sing their starlight

even as many are sleeping,

and oh! this is so good.