Palms and Pines Sacred Retreat by Jennifer Lagier
Ragged moss flutters from twisted oak limbs.
You wander dirt roads past vacant lots
to a dusty trail’s head.
Shreds of passing fog skid overhead.
Here and there, fluttering moths
dodge the dapple of sunlight.
This is the simple kingdom for which you yearn:
small bungalows beneath long needled pliant pines,
siren wind songs among the subtle whisper of leaves.
New Trail by Jennifer Lagier
The ragged sign announcing Bill Kerr Trail
hangs from a decaying pine trunk torso.
You can’t wait to place your feet upon the starting line
for the unexplored, a brand new adventure.
At first, you tread carefully, dodge scarlet poison oak,
step slowly between bulging, varicose tree roots.
Later, you whoosh through dry rattlesnake grass, eager
to crest a forested ridge, see your first glimpse of ocean.
Here and there, gnarled oaks cling to vertical hillsides.
A few late lupine half-heartedly resign themselves
to a final summer flare, revert to stubby, furred seedpods.
Glossy skunk packs patrol the weeds, looking for trouble.
Scrambling down an adobe ravine, you are stunned
by the turquoise wash, a frosty turmoil of morning tides,
tangled flotsam upon unnamed moonstone beaches,
a squawking garden of sea gulls.
Later, you will worry about hauling your heavy legs
and satiated soul back to where it all began.
But now, you savor the solitary gift of mist,
Sticky Monkey, gold waves of poppies.
Trinity by Laura Bayless
Three poets in conversation
under piebald sunshine
convene around a low table
on a gray brick patio,
guests of a benevolent benefactor.
Beneath the stippled shade
of lacework oak boughs
we gather to loaf and shed light
on the absurdities of our lives.
This is our time to escape
peculiar dramas and customary protocols.
This is our summer harbor
camouflaged in jasmine,
bird of paradise,
and tropical palms.
Twilight, Cambria by Kate Aver Avraham
Pale green moss hangs
in bearded twilight tatters
from the gray limbs of
coastal live oaks.
Mourning doves,
looking for a night of love
woo each other
with doleful duets.
Above us, roils of evening fog
ignite in slivers of silver-gold,
while we three friends
sip a dry Chardonnay,
listen to the distant drum
of breaking waves,
percussion that touches
the stretched skin of our poet souls.
Moon Over Palms and Pines House by Jennifer Lagier
Lunar illumination streams through the skylights,
stirs clotted memories long since retired,
lifts and swirls possibilities once thought asleep.
Stray pine needles sprinkle across clear squares
as I peer from my bed directly into bright moon
as it floats in the dark pulsing night.
Stillness gives permission to consider
a multitude of new trails,
all traversing Cambrian forest,
volcanic stone beaches.
I share my winding path with
languid deer swaying their way
up dirt roads and into fern canyons.
Time stretches to accommodate
and caress every artistic whim.
I feel poetry rising to the surface,
breaching like a joyful whale,
leaping between earthly dimensions
as I am welcomed back into a wild tribe.
This is the place where I relax,
rediscover my core.
Wild in the Cambria Woods by Jennifer Lagier
An energetic black and white woodpecker screams
from a twisted limb in the stunted oak tree.
Below him, we gather at the outdoor patio table,
admire his red crest, toss gluten-free crackers his way.
In this sun-gathering summer garden, pale roses
and bright bougainvillea mask a red lattice wall.
Who would have known three older women poets
could find it so easy to drop responsibility and just run away?
We sliver bits of gruyere and teleme cheese,
lift wineglasses to celebrate this Cambria escape.
Freedom stretches companionably before us.
For the first time in years, I am eager to welcome new days.
Washed Ashore by Laura Bayless
Brine-bleached logs and driftwood bundles
festooned with webs of snarled kelp
converge in scrambled compositions
tossed ashore by winter storms.
Gray forts built by beachcombers
invite entrance.
I commune with debris,
equivalent lifework wreckage,
stroll south in shifting sand,
leave deep footprints.
In shadowed alcoves
multi-colored stones find refuge
under sandstone bluffs
draped in dense robes
of sea fig and coreopsis.
I collect carefully –
brown, red, black-speckled,
one the jade green color
of the breakers just before
they dissolve into crests of foam --
consider what I might leave behind
in the ebb and flow
along the arc of a coastal curve.
Los Osos Warning by Kate Aver Avraham
Montana de Oro,
your golden slopes are haunted
by massive, foggy specters
lumbering on all fours
the way they did long ago,
before men skinned them
into extinction.
They are still here,
rising up
on the hind legs of memory,
claws slashing the air
to remind us
that all species, even our own,
could vanish,
become nothing more than
misty phantoms,
if we’re not mindful of the gifts
mother earth has given.
Montana de Oro by Jennifer Lagier
Purple blooming thistles and circling vultures frame a blue bay.
We slide downhill, grab a rock wall, take giant steps,
curse the rough trail. Everything here is decomposing:
a dead seal washed ashore and torn apart by scavenger birds,
the fragile bluff fractured by storm and rain, tourist feet.
We come to savor not confiscate. At every switchback, we pause,
admire incoming shore fog, guess wildflower names.
Below us, the stony beach displays an ever changing mosaic.
A small cottontail explodes from bright mustard; fat squirrels
forage among thrift and scarlet pimpernel for succulent seeds.
Under ancient cypress, we picnic, ignore the jeering gulls.
Headland winds rise. We are carried away.
Kindred by Kate Aver Avraham
Pine tree--
in this misty, morning light
you become another being.
The sea wind moves you
in and out of fog: green, gray,
green, gray…
As your earth body sways,
I see your spirit face, briefly
feel we are the same species.
Woodpecker by Kate Aver Avraham
Noisy among live oak
trees above me,
you tap out the code
to your next meal,
peck another hole
in mottled gray bark,
your scarlet head davening
as if hunger was a prayer
instead of necessity.
Coming Home by Kate Aver Avraham
Along Moonstone Beach
rocks and pebbles
rearrange themselves constantly,
a kaleidoscopic flux
of colors sizzling in the ebb
and push of tides.
We arrive, sift through
this abundance of variegated geology.
Our fingers caress the smooth
stone surfaces as if we, too,
had tumbled in the ocean for centuries,
then come home to the shore.
Cambria Daybreak by Jennifer Lagier
As you plod downhill, the red orb of sunrise burns
through a tangle of black silhouette pines.
Cranky stellar jays screech the news of your approach.
Beyond the tree line, black cormorants and idle sea gulls
take up the call, fanfare warning all bluff creatures
to scramble and hide as you hike briskly past.
It is 6:30 a.m. and the world is astir:
dog walkers and their bleary eyed owners
traverse the golden grass trail,
a low squadron of rosary bead pelicans
strafe open ocean, spindrift, dark waves.
You wander the boundaries of meadow,
cliff edge, and white splash of beach,
observe the world resuming its normal colors
as morning light builds.
This is the kingdom for which you yearn.
Purple fog hovers above blue hills.
A wheeling hawk screams.