Higher Ground

I have been raking leaves
since the last week of July–
a chore I usually start in late September!
I wonder, “Is the tree expiring?”
but there’s a mass of crusty, brown leaves
also on my neighbor’s tree.

It’s happening again.
Within, the season feels like autumn,
but the summer heat is stifling.
I want to be cool!
I post the rake and go inside
where the air conditioner hums,
but nothing is familiar in this cabin on the plain.

I am Elva. Jon hunts for food.
He isn’t always home daytimes or nights,
with me and our twin boys. People rarely come this way.
I often gaze into the Light
shining over the lovely mountains far behind the cabin.

I have no knowledge of crusty, brown leaves,
a neighbor’s tree
or the strange sensations in my head,
nor of visions and past lives,
but it’s autumn and Jon rushes home on horseback:
“There’s been a fire in the settlement!”
Miles away, marauders took what the dwellers had
and absconded, looking for more fertile plains.
Jon fears they will come our way.

We rush, gathering what we’ll carry,
hoping the brigands have no plans for the mountain.
Night comes, and from the distance
we see our cabin ablaze.

We follow a switchback up the slope
and walk into a peaceful village;
they welcome us, Jon hunts with them;
they’ve kept his teepee warm; We stay…
and when the Mountain Bluebird sings in spring
we descend, contemplating a new place,
new ways of doing things.