Shelter

Shelter

By Allan Rozinski

Sometimes, when the city’s crust
builds up and covers my skin,
creeps into my lungs to burrow within,
feeling like it wants to smother me,
I run off for shelter
to the cover of trees
in silent forests with cooling breezes,
and even further, up into the highlands
until the smog of civilization loosens
its gritty hold and drifts away
into the rarified air.

I’ve spied on you
from the tallest treetops
waiting until you’ve gone
out of sight, and when
it’s safe again, I will descend
to the lowly ground
to hear the sound of nature’s
timeless song of the soil
that reminds me
of my humble origins
and tells me that
both everything
and nothing matters.

I’ve sipped the wine
of morning dew
offered up by kind tulips
and gracious buttercups,
danced in meadows
wild with daisies
and scattered dandelions
disintegrating in the breeze,
sought counsel with
any robin come round,
common sparrows,
and those crafty crows
that always know
more than they let on
and most every ugly thing
humans can do,
and even so, still they spy on us
to find out what else we’re up to.

While in the distance
far and near,
born in every town
is the menace and fear
where the people live
in their brittle little houses or
fancy fortresses, where so many
never really settle, never find
themselves at home.


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