Promising as a birch, restless as a spiral,
I grow here by myself,
altered by myself
and whatever elements are left to me.
No one sees how I work on my creation,
the changes that I make and undergo,
tempered then mollified
by the company of wind, cycles of sun, visitations of rain.
Now I am all wonders and sensations,
curious, flighty, observing everything.
From thought to thought
no bird hops faster.
Next, I am a fixed, rooted thing;
taller, stronger,
more like the tower I am kept in,
with a mind to match it– unbending,
accustomed to solitude.
Now I incorporate the garden’s work,
its stream’s rushing waters,
wild scents, the sap of flowers.
Give me the deep, wet green of those stems —
their crimson petals like fresh blood,
the aurous center that holds the petals in sun’s gold;
I will make something new of them you have never seen.
I invent and re-invent myself.
I choose to be no one single thing,
but in the becoming, become all.
I spend much time pondering,
staring out at Emain Macha over great distances,
trying to invent a word for the newborn air,
its fragile scent redolent,
a foundling
I can’t yet name.