High Country

Here
where the stillness breathes in silent wonder,

softly met from time to time
by flowers slightly stirred and
by wings blending with universal rhythms

Here
where the freshness cleans and cleanses
in beauty and oneness

Here
where the mountains envelop
with their ancient spirits
singing and safeguarding
the sanctity and fullness of life
and eternal verities

Here
you are!
a fresh, golden buttercup,
new, sturdy, fragile,
shining as the snow melts
your eternal friendship
lightly held and firmly known
in all the vast and secret places
that hearts and spirits find
in traveling on beyond.

Here
the sun and you are golden, joyous friends,
laughing in the sparkling, dancing circle
where we join and hold your hand.

For my mother, Marguerite Kober Gerlach
Margery Layton
1978

Free Gift

The voice of her songs
and
the songs of her voice
keep singing on
throughout the universe
and
in hearts of true knowing
that join in from anywhere
and
nowhere
and everywhere.

Souls in flight
rest softly
on passing clouds,
gently nodding
to earthbound ones,
inviting them to join in
the new/old awakenings,
blending their rainbow hopes
with soft filled prayers.

Margery Layton
3-2011
(in honor of my mother,
Marguerite Kober Gerlach)

Morning Dew

With gentle thoughts
and soft-lit sighs,

with bright winged birds
and endless skies.

Margery Layton
7-27-2011

(In honor of Marguerite Kober Gerlach)
b. 7-27-1891
d. 5-21-l978

Ode to Aunt Florence Gerlach

You gave us dignity and grace,
a flowered charm growing through
the garden of your soul.

A gardener you always were,
tending to the soil,
pulling out each weed with meticulous care.

No tears watered your ground,
just a special kind of dry-eyed persistence
partnered with an amazing endurance
that wore down the odds.

Valiant lady, quiet friend,
sensitive with delicate understanding,
safeguarding vulnerabilities
with quiet knowing.

Sharp, incisive mind cutting through confusions,
slicing through tangles with clear reason.
Coolheaded logic frosting out demands,
inserting wisdom of the years to unlock fears
and open fresh doors of understandings.

Always a gardener,
implanting in us your surest and truest seeds.

A butterfly, wings tipped with golden wonder,
hovers briefly over your garden
before blending itself with sun and sky.
Its universal message lights once more upon our hearts.

Margery Layton
Spring, 1989

Softly Spring

The heart of spring

is spring-filled hearts,

the kinds that give us all fresh starts.

The silent hopes

and quiet dreams

gather by the living streams.

A note of joy

and bluer sky

gift us with a gentle sigh.

A softer ground

from feathered snow

prepares our earth and helps us grow.

A cleansing rain

and rainbow spread

give cover to our garden bed.

A warmer sun

soft lights the way

and gives to each our newborn day.

Margery Layton

3-2000

(In loving honor of Howard Waltz, an eternal spring)

Ode to Mariel

You are known in hearted wholeness.

You are felt in warm-lit passageways.

You are seen in sparkling wonderment.

You are heard in life's own music.

You are found in hope and joy.

You are treasured in your treasures.

You are shining, sparkling crystals.

You are humor wrapped in faith.

You are courage and mind reaching.

You are grace and you are light.

You are wonder.

You are you!

Margery Layton

Spring, 1996

Louise

Louise

Here on the shores of tranquility
a heart of true, sure knowing comes shining through.

Practical, determined and yet---
ethereal in its wings and wisdom.

Rays beaming us on and safely through,
with soft-lit smiles and gentle laughter.

Endearing and enduring,
while sprinkling us with feistiness,
close attentiveness
and all that loves and lasts.

Margery Layton
10-2011

(In loving honor of Louise Smith,
an eternal friend.)