BY JOHN GREY

Copyright is held by the author.

I asked for a lake
and one was dropped off
at my doorstep.

“And how about some hills,”
I said.
The slopes rise gently all around.

Pines are in the ascendancy
but oaks, maples
and their deciduous kin
fill in the spaces.

The world even threw
in mountains,
distant sure,
but just what the horizon needed.

A loan floats serenely
across the surface of that lake.
Not something I requested
but a gift nevertheless.

And a bald eagle soars high.
I’d have taken a hawk
or even a kestrel
but I don’t say no
to such soaring majesty.

I didn’t request
the most spectacular scenery
the world has to offer.
I didn’t beg for
the wildest of the wildlife.

Instead, I asked only for enough — 
and the world, generous beyond measure, 
laid its hand upon my shoulder. 

***

John Grey is an Australian poet, U.S. resident, recently published in Shift, River And South and Flights. Latest books, Bittersweet, Subject Matters and Between Two Fires are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in Rush, Writer’s Block and Trampoline.