Two Poems by Greg Smith: Transition, Walking the River

Transition

It is so quiet I can hear
the first faint breath
of the cosmos,
and the sighs
of its mother,
relaxing after birth.
Stars above me
as I walk away.
Sirius barking
while the dipper pours forth.
I move companioned by silence
and balanced between worlds.
The sound of my steps
ripples away
and the tuning fork of morning
coming alive,
grows between the air.
It is the moment of transition,
the shutter click behind the world,
when night bows out
and exits,
leaving daylight to the stage.
It is a grain, a fractional wisp,
a parcel of time so elusive
that with a thought it is unmade.

Walking the River

I walked the river back
through forest, brush, and time.
I walked through eons,
passed the relics and scribbled residue
of all that went before.
Eternity flowed beneath my feet
and I walked the river back.
I walked past the birth of suns
and watched them fade to ash.
Galaxies formed,
heaved across the void to extinction
and still I walked the river back.
Each step evolved like an embryo,
as my needless mesh and lattice work
dissolved into essentials.
I walked back until born from within
and the river led me home.

Copyright 2008, Greg Smith. © This work is protected under the U.S. copyright laws. It may not be reproduced, reprinted, reused, or altered without the expressed written permission of the author.

Greg Smith's poetry has appeared in The Antigonish Review and Umbrella. He was also awarded the first annual Quinte Arts Council poetry prize. Born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Smith received a Bachelor of Science degree in Kinesiology from Dalhousie University. After fourteen years of living in Toronto, Greg and his wife relocated to the small city of Belleville, Ontario, where he currently earns his living providing personal training and physical rehabilitation services.