Witness

by Joan Osterman

(Published in Peacocks & Poems: a fusion of poetry, art, and music, 2024)

I wake to the drone of TV news, haunting my shared wall.
Morning unfurls—a fiddlehead, tender, delicious.
Outside, a new day opens, alive with wonder.

Wind ruffles the sky, washing it blue. Songbirds call,  
squirrels scamper on branches of a stately redwood.
Silence seeps in between the chatter.

The scent of star jasmine blooms into warming air.
A hot air balloon, red, yellow, purple stripes,
chuffs overhead. A lizard skitters over my foot—

hundreds of millions of years flit through its short life.
Baby ferns spread through my garden, using survival skills
honed over eons. A delicate blue dragonfly, traveling
from prehistory, pauses to be with us for a week or two.

Walking uphill, my joints creak and groan. I lean against
the rough bark of a pine, at ease knowing trees will breathe
long after I’ve stopped, and the ocean will continue roiling
when I am still.