May 20*

big slug slimes up, across
the kitchen glass door

it must feel like
walking on water or

               floating away, suspended in light

*Copyright 2010 by Luther Allen. This poem appears in The View from Lummi Island.
. . . . .
slug photo

May 14*

whatcom chief gone for two weeks of annual maintenance
we ride the ’squito, a 50 passenger foot ferry
out of our car shells, we meet, chatter on the crossing

hard wind, rain—december weather someone complains
the ’squito bounces at the dock, the old man next to me
says if he didn’t have to feed his dog, he would have stayed
on the mainland, rented a hotel room.

do you ever get used to this weather —
how long have you been on the island?

he thinks, calculating.
over 70 years, and hell no.

*Copyright 2010 by Luther Allen. This poem appears in The View from Lummi Island.
. . . . .
photo

May 12*

behind my house
wild maelstrom of tangle
looming ragged firs
harboring the nightcreatures

we go there to dream
of the sacred, the profound

and in the morning
we pray in the ether
that has seeped out in the night
curled around the houses,
flooded through our things.

no one touches this place.
we hold it in our breath.

*Copyright 2010 by Luther Allen. This poem appears in The View from Lummi Island.

May 10*

the damp seething

               shadowy sky in wet swirls
               purple blots and grey daubs
               smelling of iris and fir, roses
               and new ferns, all dripping

of this sunless life

*Copyright 2010 by Luther Allen. This poem appears in The View from Lummi Island.

May 9*

mile upon mile
of four billion year old saltwater
smeared smooth by no wind
ironed out flat
this day
in
slicked silvers
and glints of glimmer
and ghost clouds
               way off, rolled up
               over the islands, peaks
all in pale blue
vapor

*Copyright 2010 by Luther Allen. This poem appears in The View from Lummi Island.

May 7*

travel through
overgrown path

ward off
               blackberry
brush knee
               against tall grass

white blossomed branch
               of thimbleberry
spreads its wings

part the wild
               ocean spray’s mane
the single whip
               of drooping alder branch

suspended from heaven
rooted in earth

*Copyright 2010 by Luther Allen. This poem appears in The View from Lummi Island.
. . . . .
thimbleberry photo

April 30*

the old second growth
of firs and cedars
roil and scatter, orchestrate
the restless
oceans of air
passing through, over
this island

never to be
the same

*Copyright 2010 by Luther Allen. This poem appears in The View from Lummi Island.