Its mouth gurgles Gregorian chants -
no half notes or quarters or sixteenths
but from its bowels steady-flowing vowels
leaking, laughing over stones
shaped and smoothed
by eons' incarnations of seas and sands.

Its loins sing and hiss
the hymns of cells, and tissue
their issue rained softly
into the soul
cosmos songs haltingly hurled
clear of the grasp and snarls of life.

Its heart beats its bloody rhythm
ticky ticky tick
slither slidey slip
pushing pushing
gushing gushing
up and over
edge to edge
it's relentless surge -
so that heart and mind ease their edgy throb
slowing, staying, stilling
whispering, sighing, filling
emptying, and restoring.... peace.

Dedicated to Pablo Neruda