DESERT PRAYER- One morning, in a dry month of the driest year, Lasted long and whispered solemn in my desert ear. And many signs and omens on that secret day, In the sort of irony God relishes, were sent my way. But one, a tortoise in the sun, besieged by butterflies (mining minerals from its' nostrils and eyes) Made me wonder - was it time for prayer, Time to tell God I had seen Him there? But expressions of faith, like water and meat Are hard to find in the desert heat, So many prayers remain unfound The words lie scattered on the ground. Then spoke my desert heart "this drought has just begun. There will be dryness now with little or no sun." Even now, in winter, the leather of my desert soul is cracked, How much better its first owner were alive to care and take it back.

A RIVER IN FRANCE- The night lamps spill amber pools on the Compiegne bridge, Like the yellow fields of rapeseed south of Paris Billowing beyond the view of trains and eyes, And skies, gray as the water and the barges between Paris and the sea, That ocean, greener than the Ardennes in April. The village I love is a river in France, The rivers and towns are the same to me, whether the Rhone,La Seine, Compienge or Paris, The rivers and towns flow down to the sea. If I returned somehow to the river that was, Remembering all that I used to be, Could I see myself standing here twenty years hence With time running down like this river in France To the sad salt taste of eternity.