You are living, always,
in the space between breaths.
Gentle, you held the moments,
sensing their fragility
like eggshells on rocks.
Now the moments hold you.
The trees return your embrace,
recognizing,
honoring,
seeing in you what you saw in them;
the foxes, the sparrows, the wild geese,
the doe who met you in silence,
dear sweet redbird,
the turtles, and the grasshopper -
this grasshopper, I mean -
and the prayer-grass and the mountains,
and the stones that wear patience like a face -
all the wonders of your world wonder at your life.
They bow their heads -
the streams and the mountains, all -
and they say:
here there was a child of ecstacy,
a wild and holy thing,
and how we loved to watch her dance.
