defining my macrocosm

There is solace in the company of cedars,
a fluidity to the air by this familiar creek.
Larger stones bare their backs to slatted sunlight,
dry in the eternal prairie wind. Darting minnows
find this stream too shallow, but it is my ocean,
the opposite shore another coast, its sloped bank

built of foreign soil. The climate breeds all gusts
and unnamed storms. Legend has it only fools
tie up there, hitched to rock as brittle as midwinter.
On my side there are bluebottles born to stitch
tall reeds, a ruffled chirr concocted to cover silence
like smut on a lantern’s curved glass. I am obliged

to drowse and consider the fording of this fabled sea.
How easily I could gain transport across so thin
and unremarkable a spill. Barely a drop would follow
me into the alien copse. Already I wear the costume
of a native, woven like a scar into my willing flesh.
But even in sleep I lie anchored, sunk fast and deep

in bisque and history. I awaken to a small eddy
where frostweed petals spin like stars in a fluid sky.
Behind me waits a well-worn path, certain passage
engendered by my own steady hand. As I walk
I cannot help but note the dampness of my lacy hem,
the way my skirt is weighted with the froth of dreams.