Her Heart Was Caged in Spruce and Pine

Leave the woodpile to rest,
latch up the duck house to keep them from the foxes.
Walk slow up the waning sunlight hill,
grass cool and dry still
under lazy, ascending feet.

She goes about the evening routine,
feeding the animals and drinking in the splendor
of berries growing wild in the bush,
a night about to fall.
Throat cool and quenched from the
early summer air, infused with some magic
of ardor and imagination,
an invitation
to be vacant,
unnoticed
for a little while,
to meet quietly with her loyal love-
always faithful is the night.

So in this blissful cool of dusk,
she looked up to the sky and thought,
"I want to be free but I want to be loved."
She wondered if nature could afford her
all the affection she needed.
After all, the hammock was gently rocking her
as if a child,
and the sparrows and swallows offered their songs
as lullabies.
Nature was free but it was always with her,
the most loyal of lovers indeed.

You see, her heart was caged in spruce and pine,
latticed birch and cedar.
A jealous partner is the summer night
of wood, and sky and freedom.