A fool I knew said the world was broken,
That paradise no longer existed,
As if the field mouse’s neck wasn’t twisted
By the owl before the snake dropped his token
Of love into the hand of fearless Eve.
It’s spring. The screech owls nest and redbuds glow.
That’s all the paradise we need to know,
Though tragedies occur and the good grieve.
It took forty days and nights of deluge
To wash away paradise, leaving mud —
Just mud — not even bone and hair and blood.
All dissolved in a maelstrom centrifuge.
We live post re-genesis. Each life dies.
Each day I tell myself, “Open your eyes.”