Untouchable

.

All you want me to bring back is a rock. No gifts,

no fine words - not even these. But you must 

understand I have spent a lifetime making my way 

to the edge of this stream where I sit in the spent

leaves writing what I know cannot be written. As 

twilight thickens over my fingers, I realize these 

words are falling short of the page. At last I see

your stone, luminescent in the gurgling darkness.

Forgive me for returning empty-handed, but if

I touch it now, I may never get home.

.

~ Jim Sagel

.

I am thinking of the space between the stars

Estrella Fugaz

 

I am thinking of the space between the stars when

a tail of fire abruptly blazes in the San Ildefonso sky.

Just so unpredictably did I tumble from orbit, my

identity engulfed in flames.  Yet, my only wish is to

fall out of myself again and again.

 

****

Runoff

 

Braced against the current, I battle the swollen creek

for a foothold on these ricks polished by the water's

desire for the sea, the same insatiable thirst that

surges though my blood.

 

~ Jim Sagel, from 'unexpected turn'