My church is a ring of alders tilting
toward a living pond, backed by
the punctuation of tall firs fondling
the morning breeze.
In my chapel, redwing blackbird
unravels her liquid song in the cattails.
The thick mud smell is an incense,
a beaver-felled tree is my pew.
I toss my donation, red huckleberries,
into this humble water where
the secret trout leaps.
Cedar waxwings are my songs lifting
from a hymnal penned by water touching sky,
and the courting dragonflies weave
my salamander prayer.
I need no minister, for that is me,
Alpha and Omega, breathing out
my own measured days
in this wet forest cathedral.