Here in the woods my soul is growing
It leaps among the acorns that litter the ground like discarded diamonds
and nestles next to the bright orange mushrooms that grow stealthily 
on the underside of the woodpile
it climbs to the top of the black maple dropping its seeds on the roof of my cabin
little paratroopers fluttering softly down in tiny green helicopters
it slides across the stream outside my window
bursting forth its bonds like a dam straining to break through its walls
like the summer storms that wash across these mountains, 
dumping their rain in great torrents
it crawls into the damp, fragrant dirt of the flower garden
to share it with earthworms and spiders
and expands into the thunder clouds that hover over these hills
like forgotten gods, glowering and angry

This growing is alarming, confusing –
the almost unbearable ecstasy threatens to bury me
and I mourn my old self
as one mourns the shed husk of a molting animal – 
a snake, a caterpillar, a moth, a butterfly –
leaving behind its old home
like the yellowed, dried cocoons still clinging to the potted geranium on my window sill
and yet as the sun creeps shyly across my doorstep, 
falling on the red petals of the geranium,
I throw the covers from my bed
And step out into the blinding sunlight of another day