Patti Trimble lives in Sicily and California. She is best known for her performances of lyric poetry with music. She is also an essayist and painter. Full bio on pages 3 and 5.
Standing in a Parking Lot in San Rafael, California
In the 1960s, near where you stand,
a two lane highway, a wild field.
We walked most places then,
and on the easy rise above this marsh
my sister caught a tiny mission blue,
opened her hand to show me a secret
which flew away.
I showed her one purple lupine,
and made her breathe in the scent
to know our time was now, only now.
In the same spot today, a freeway,
six lanes, a pretty nice hotel
with a tropical garden, indoors,
between the stairs, such industry,
to scrape down my favorite place on Earth
and reshape its nature.
I am myself the vanishing one—
and those children who walk unaccompanied
on railroad tracks, who know
which butterfly lives with which flower
who thrill for the beauty of fragile flight
and breath in the lupine whole—
inhale the sweet and bitter world.
You can watch/listen to Prayer For the New Milleniumand two other poems, here:Prayer
