Any Moment

Unbound, like a child in summer land,

I walked from work at sunset

and happiness found herself in my chest.

She floated upward through my throat

and mouth and eyes.

We were humming along like sister clouds,

so I asked her, “Why now?”

Silence.

I thought I had jinxed the spell

but she stroked my hair. 

She wouldn’t answer,

but drifted north again, into my brain,

into the dust of memory –

big and little fingers in licks of tide,

digging to save the castle;

another workday, long-good-done,

and evening ahead, honeyed with twilight;

rapids of snow-melt against canyon rock, 

cerise and tangerine as if on fire.

I awakened on a mat of grass, 

beside a tree that smelled like pine.

I swear I wasn’t dreaming 

when happiness raised her eyebrows, 

and evaporated back into sky.