Hear the breath of the earth.

Hear the breath of the earth.
Will I cry, laugh or sing?
Will I be alone or part of one
Whole? I cannot know. I fall,
And as I fall, and call, I think.
I think of ascent. To float, to
Feel the brave tug of surface tension.
To hear the rush of free air -
The wind in the tall trees,
The cry of an owl. To be born,
Again. To know gravity, without
The contamination of buoyancy.

Leeds, late 1989