Web

Paws for Thought

Giving pause for thought
can be
pause for naught.

But paws for thought
cannot be bought!

Cats all know
that special glow
that needs no cause
but just their paws!

Margery Layton
7-2012

Natural Heart and Spirit of Time

The Natural Heart and Spirit of Time

The sun of today shines up past remains
with the light of tomorrow’s.
The moon of yesterday softens the glare of harsh today's.

The earth cradles our time
and rocks the mechanical clocks to sleep
with the song of its own endurance.

The clouds cover the mystery of time
and rain the jagged, aging reminders into softness.

The winds of change swirl up the egg of time
with their invisible arms
and deposit it safely into the future.

The river of time is a winding thread
leading the past to today's and tomorrow’s.

The sea sings of the mystery of time
and hides its secrets within her depths.

The grave of the past
is the womb of the unborn future.

The dust of past remains
becomes the seed for new life.

The corpse of yesterday
is the embryo of tomorrow.
The shroud of the corpse is the swaddling clothes of rebirth.

The candle of faith lights the possibilities
of a multicolored future.

The everlasting music of time
plays the rhythms of timelessness,
sings the beauty of its own essence
and expresses the tangibility of its intangibility.

The natural heart and spirit of time
beckons us to chart the unmapped ocean of the future.

Timelessness flows freely and surely on its own true course.

Margery Layton
(in the 60’s)

Natural Travelers

The ground we walk holds how we feel
and pulsates with each friendly step.

The sky that covers where we go
lightly blankets why we're there.

Moons and suns that follow us
play around our inner glows.

Darkness shelters deeper dreams;
lightness sings the way.

Margery Layton
1972

Builders

A soft-knit nest is where we live
and where we like to be.

The tree form is irrelevant.
A tree is still a tree.
But we are we and us and them
whatever forms there are.

Our usness is our essence
and our hopes a close-knit star.

Margery Layton
1994

Web

I spin upon the web of life
in colors strong and bold,
weaving stories as I go
in ways both new and old.

Some other webs entangle,
but mine is clean and straight.
Come join me in this fresh, clear way
and know that you are great!

Margery Layton
(for Mariel)
8-97

Poem Struck

Thunder rolls and lightning strikes
on placid ponds and quiet hikes,
rumbling, bumbling , rippling then
just circling back to strike again.

Poem strikes come from ..who knows where?
From Mother Earth or in the air?
They find pure gold and bring it through
to hearted places
softly new
(oldly, too)
and always true.

Margery Layton
6-98

A Tree

A growing, sturdy pushing up,
A spreading, branching, moving out,
A swinging, searching for the wind,
A standing for the sun and rain.

A giving, shading, shelter place,
A fruitful, kindly, quiet store,
A waiting, hiding treasure cave,
A trunk of brown and solid dreams.

Margery Layton
1973

A Flower

A color,
A smell,
A growing up,
A stretching out,
A blowing by the wind,
A standing still,
A being shined on,
A being rained on,
A being mooned on,
A being there in the ground,
A saying "no" to the weeds,
A staying a flower!

Margery Layton
1973

The Spring of New Beginnings

In the spring of new beginnings,
the freshness comes again,
reminding us that nature's cold
is cover for its warmth,
protecting us from harm.

The seeds of new beginnings
always find their way
through the darkness of the earth
to the sunshine of their day.

Margery Layton
1987

(See also Softly Spring under Odes)

Green

A cool, green thought
came to light upon
a single leaf,
placed in a jar
where it will continue
to grow and spread
with fresh resolve,
new found ways,
and songs of life and love.
Margery Layton
1987

Gold

Fun filled times and joy spun days
are music for the brighter ways.
Bubbling laughter streams the fun
to green-cooled spots and lemon sun.

Playing in a circled time
radiates the tone and rhyme
for friendly words and happy songs
where spiced-tuned, vital life belongs.

Margery Layton
6-98

Song in Lime

A cooling breeze lightly touched
the lime-green wings of a passing bird,
sending it on to feather-stroke ones who know its song,
then fanning them with whiffs of kindly thoughts
and nesting them in shadowed coverlets
as sun gold reigns supreme.

Margery Layton
7-99

See Saw

In the sea of what I see
all I see belongs to me.
On the shore of what I share
all I share is happy there.

In the sky of what I know
brighter, stronger visions grow.
In the heart of everything
universal spirits sing.

Margery Layton
1988

One Leaf

One leaf fell slowly
like an autumned afterthought
into my lap,
wanting to be felt and heard
until the gentle wind took it once again
to nest beneath the tree.

Then lifting it once again,
colors glistening,
to taste the blueness of the sky
to the silent whisper
of my accompaniment.

Margery Layton
1987

Fall Light

Orange gold and glimmered treasures,
leaves in soft array,
scattered through the sturdy greens
of trees that stand and stay.

Margery Layton
(in the 80's)

Snow Thoughts

The soft silence breathes its way through the snow,
its feathered softness giving pause to thought..
and wings for belief.

Moving through the silence..
a softened glow of hope lights its own way through,
whispering a grace note in its passage.

Snow Spring

Softly springing in the snow
blends belief with what we know.
The truth inside, with warmth and light,
flows gently out
into the night.

The way to walk upon the snow,
is lightly, footprints fading as we go.
Ploughing deeply,
sliding, too,
is not the way that gets us through.

Each flake that softens Mother Earth
gives each of us a second birth.
Wonders find us as we rest
inside that snow-filled earthly nest.

Margery Layton
12-2002