Landscape as Prayer

(1)       Derwent Water, Cumbria

Mountains midnight blue and
++a lighter blue, pink-coral sky

in relief, smooth, yet jagged lines
++in contrast

as if to say this is a clearing

a new way to you

Mountains high and lower, lines
++diagonal, but resting near

the horizon black, grey-black
the ground level on black

Mountains further back, three or
++four mountains back, flatter,

flattened, like a conversation gone
++silent

(2)       Loch Lomond, Scotland in August

the blue is the distance from surface
++to sea ground like a mirror
shattered into    pieces    a thousand glinting

and this here           is the place that comes
++++closest to
losing you again:

++Loch Lomond
++++in the mist and    drizzle
mountains    sliding across

in a moving frame    fog and mist
++shattered like shards
+grey almost blue    and light grey together

mountains dreamy and pure
++++is the distance
++this is the closest to losing

++the blue is the light that got lost
from the sun: dispersed into:
+++molecules    listen

grey almost like blue    like fog like mist
++this feels like losing      again
+losing you is like

This poem, with others by the author, appears in Issue 26 of The Mockingbird print magazine.