Return from the West

After returning
from the endless skies,
encircled by long horizons,
and driving the visible miles
on the plains of Kansas;

After viewing Colorado's
bouldered streams
and magnificent mountains
growing with tall spruces
and spreading Ponderosa Pines;

I am surrounded, again,
by this wall of green;
a thick, humid canopy
of Red Oaks and Black Oaks,
this density of summer leaves.

The far out
crowns of trees
are swaying in the wind,
brushing the sky
back and forth.

But down here
on the backyard deck,
only a breath of breeze gets through.
Enough to turn the page
of the book I'm reading,

and suggest an idea
for a new poem.

© 2016 Richard Havenga

Photo Locations:

1. Buena Vista, Colorado 

2. Arkansas River - Buena Vista, Colorado

3. Rocky Mountain National Park - Colorado

4. Home Woods - Cannonsburg, Michigan