Moon Over Arzúa

(from the moon series - Camino de Santiago edition)

Here we have arrived in modernity
after a long walk down a dirt road
path through the forest of tall
thin white trees, where the beds cost
more and the food tastes less
and the traffic whooshes outside
the convenient elevators taking you up
past first and second floors and I walk
further away from the sound of the guitar
and closer to Santiago, closer to my baby’s
arms and her blue eyes. Here we are
unmoving until tomorrow as the constant
battle with time goes on and on
and some people learn to live
with the sounds of bombs and others
join the fight and others pretend
it doesn’t exist and fall asleep
to dream of better places and faces.

Moon Over the Monastery at Sobrado dos Monxes

(from the moon series - Camino de Santiago edition)

as a stuffy monk chooses beds
for tired travellers and the wind blows in
down from the hills, down from the heavens,
down through the ages, as this was always a stop
for pilgrims but they didn’t always wear All Stars
and they didn’t always smoke just outside the chapel
in the darkness and they didn’t always complain
about the smell and the squeaky door
and the snorers in the bedrooms but

as we sleep in a room with stone hand made
walls and a curved white stone ceiling, I think
about the tired souls longing for arrival in Santiago,
longing for arrival wherever they are going
and the monks souls that are already here
and I ask, have they already arrived?

New Moon Over Five Chairs in the Gravel Road

(from the moon series - Camino de Santiago edition)

talking until ten thirty after a long day
of walking and looking at the country side
houses and castles with stone walls built
from hand as the three layers of clouds sit
in the sky, the lowest

like fire smoke moving quickly north
or east or whatever direction we came from,

the middle layer still and white fluff
with orange glow on the border
from the setting sun,

the upper layer so high it just sets a faint
streak against a baby blue sky and we talk

about words and we talk about people
and we talk to enjoy the company of each
other on the fine night in July and we talk
to know and share the ways of the world
through the bond of human experience
and the laugh of absurd happenings
and funny occurrences and the fruit of the days.

Moon Over the Tenth Night

(from the moon series - Camino de Santiago edition)

feels better, has slept, has legs to walk
further, has plans to finish the excursion,
dreams during the day, listens to Canadian
tongues, listens to religious tongues, doesn’t judge
and listens, understands there are so many
ways, so many things to misunderstand,
so many new things to share on one
shared journey, walks and feels the walking
less, yields to the ears, the buckets of ears
while soft gray clouds pass overhead, passing
time as always, asking the profound questions
about age, about evolution, about the inevitable
end of consciousness, comes back to ground
and laughs, laughs at jokes and laughs at quirky
people and laughs at absurdities that are grown
through this life time of odd experiences and air.

Moon Over Miraz

(from the moon series - Camino de Santiago edition)

Yesterday I slept in a field
and the buzzing flies
drove me mad to be inside
in the comfort of bed so
I dreamt of walls
as the wind brushed my face
and rustled the leaves
on the branches of the trees
hovering overhead
and the blades of grass wiggled
in front of my closed eyes
on the first Monday of July.

It is important to watch the clouds
and to be scared for the rain
has disappeared slowly
in the best days of summer
when being alone
doesn’t mean being without
someone but being away
from people and things
and buzzes and clicks
and the swirling machine
of population.

Moon Over the Dude Who Rings the Bells

(from the moon series - Camino de Santiago edition)

I wake up to the bells, struck twelve times
and I wonder about the days in the fields
of the farms, in the streets of the towns
when no one had a watch and I wonder

how the church measured time, how
they knew it was noon, and I wake up
to the birds and my body aches
in this hand made stone building

and I wake to voices and hunger
and I wake without alarm, without time,
just the yells of cats and the sun inching
along the floor, in through the half door

wooden, and I wake expecting my friends
in the early afternoon in Baamonde.

Moon Over Miriam and Frank

(from the moon series - Camino de Santiago edition)

winks at the same time with different eyes, chats
and laughs and makes fun, throws sarcasm
in Dutch, throws sarcasm in English, reads
in silence and squiggles its toes, cooks
fabulous meal from barely nothing, only
what’s at the small town bar/grocery, talks
of the spirit, of the body, the power of thought,
the dreams of energy, carries a heavy load
in backpack, walks blisterless with magic foot
cream, carries troubles and laughter, one heavy
as hell and the other lighter than air, and
makes the pilgrimage all the way from Holland to Santiago.

Moon Over the Ninth Night

(from the moon series - Camino de Santiago edition)

This was the hardest day by far. Forget the hills
and the climbs. Forget the forty kilometer days
and the days of rain. Forget the days alone
and the days without water. This

was the hardest day. And the whole time
I kept dreaming of you. The whole time
I kept thinking of your face and how you laugh.
The whole time I would have given anything

to just be laying in bed with you with my arms
tight around you, with you taking care of me
in the soft way that you do. The whole time.
But I had to walk. There was no other option.

I had to push on further and further until
I arrived and even then I wished to be with you.
Even then in the shadow of the hot Spanish afternoon
sitting in front of a Galician farm house.