Life Begins In Half An Hour

Life begins in half an hour
when the morning sun wakes fields of
yellow flowers on the mountain slope
and sleepy streams roll quickly toward the sea.
Dew polishes slick green leaves,
and only the nose of the gray rabbit
can be seen sniffing morning's fragrance
from the mossy opening to her den.

It is too early for wind's song to begin
but in the giddy anticipation of
first flight, young hawks
stretch their untested wings
and wonder about the leap into transparent
nothingness, the sensation of being pulled
to the ground by gravity's force
and fear's grip.
Ah, but the moment of stability
when the strength of wing overcomes
the grasp of gravity and the whole world
changes from sinking to soaring.

The most glorious words of poets and pundits
fail to describe that electric second
when the curved wing of nature catches the sun warmed
current of first light and the call goes out across
meadow and ridge, through aspen groves all the
way to snow covered peaks:
It is time!
It is time?