Do Well the Little Things of Life

—David of Wales

This week the tops of the peaks
have turned white with first snow.
Most leaves from the aspens
have fallen and scattered in wind.
A few, still green, hang amid the yellow.
Soon I will pull the mountains
close around me like a shawl.
Today I remind myself
what once was is not ever gone.

Mushrooms I hunted and dried
fill a pot in the pantry to season
winter suppers. On a freezer shelf
I’ve stored peaches, golden halves
to sweeten cold mornings. And
in a small bag I’ve saved pods
of hollyhock seeds I gathered
in an alley in town to plant
in next spring’s soft earth.
Each of these tasks
I wore as a simple garment.

It is said St. David made a hill arise
from the Welsh plain where he stood
though he lived a holy and ascetic life,
eating only bread with salt and herbs,
drinking only water. At his death
in 600 CE people said the abbey
was filled with singing angels
though they could have been doves.

Blue Heron

Wet springtime snows
fall on the stalwart forest
and on the mountain roads,
in the valley a gauzy rain
drops in pastures where
cottonwoods and aspen
already whisper green.

Through the white mist
finch, flicker, swallow, swift
wing nest to seed to oak branch
rise on uncertain air to
dip, dart and glide in cursive.

is there a hymn in this latest
gathering of clouds?
omen of another storm?
does prayer take its shape
in the changing winds?

These and other questions
suspend above a puddled path
pocked with boot prints
along the white-lipped river

where others have breathed
in their hopes and I hold up mine
for healing, reconciliation
acceptance of what is and
of what will surely change.

Next month lupine will spread
its blue haze over the foothills
beside the trail, sun-heated
claret cups spill over black rock
and from a field the fragrance
of first-cut hay will rise

but today where thin ribbons
of water fall to the sodden banks
a blue heron, unpackaging
its graceful body, steps
eagerly into mud shallows.

Earthly Pleasures

I wash them in the sink, each small globe slick-skinned—
shiny wine red Bings and Raniers, bright red and honey-hued.

These once-wild fruits of the northwest I bite into
and remember a Kentucky summer my young mother

embroidered cherries, their green leaves and stems
on blue sundresses she sewed for my sisters and me.

Montmorencies grew there, smaller and too tart
for eating out of hand save with a spoon of sugar

so she pitted them, then put them up or into a pie.
Only a dollar a pound the woman I barely knew said

when she handed me the white plastic bagful
she had picked at a Colorado orchard the day before.

As I spill all the cherries into a big yellow bowl,
they are heaped jewels. All evening I can’t keep from

reaching in the fridge for just a few more, savoring
each as its dark juice drips on my lips, stains my fingers.

Best eat them soon, she told me, smiling when I thanked her,
I who already have been given much and now these also.

For me writing poetry is a meditative as well as an intellectual process. When I allow myself to be alone in a place of deep focus, I am able to find the words for my thoughts. Both the practice of yoga and my Christian faith contribute to my spiritual awareness. I am also inspired daily by my observations of the natural world in the high mountain landscape where I live.

Beth Paulson writes and leads poetry workshops in western Colorado where she has lived since 1999. Before that she taught English at California State University for over twenty years. She has also been a columnist for the Ouray County Plaindealer. Beth currently leads Poetica, a monthly poetry workshop for Ridgway-Ouray area writers and co-directs the Open Bard Poetry Series in Ridgway, Colorado. In April 2019 Beth was named the first Poet Laureate of Ouray County.

Beth’s poems have appeared widely in national literary magazines and several anthologies. She has been nominated four times for Pushcart Prizes for poetry and has also been a Best of the Net nominee.

Beth is the author of five poetry collections: Immensity (Kelsay Books, 2016), Canyon Notes (Mt. Sneffels Press, 2013), Wild Raspberries (Plain View Press, 2009), The Company of Trees (2004) and The Truth About Thunder (2001), both by Ponderosa Press. In 2019 she co-authored with Don Paulson Images of the Mountain West: Photographs and Poems (Twain Publishers).

An avid hiker and Nordic skier, Beth lives with her husband in the shadow of 13,000 feet Whitehouse Mountain.

More on Beth Paulson’s work can be found on our Links page.