A poem by: Ben Dunk. 1969

JOHN’S CHILD

John rides in the Rockies,

Where the water cascades

Over the boulders of granite

And flickering rivulets

Meet and swell major streams.

She lifts her eyes to the snow ridge

Dwelling on puffs of white clouds

Slowly girdling their way along

And around the glorious peaks

Rising and falling fading and increasing

Bemusing the watcher with their cycles.

Conception.

Come with me among the pines

Smell the resinous bark in the air

Feel the soft blanket of pine needles

Patchwork fallen on forest floor

Twixt rock and tree fallen

Spy the modest twinkling of a flower.

Here a bird with sunlit flashed wings

There a buzzing fly drops into white spider web

Here a dashing squirrel to familiar tree trunk

White tailed doe disappearing fast

Moles mutely rummage under the rubbish

And a creature’s bare white skeleton ends

Where and when new life begins.