Right Here

Not easy to hear the soft chant of my breath
with the rumble of river nearby.
Even the low water hymn of late autumn
is loud enough to cover the small,
familiar song of inhale and exhale.
Further out is the sharp thwack of hammer
head meeting nail. Another nail. Another.
An elated whoop from the man with the hammer.
And further out, the growl of semi trucks
migrating east on the highway. If I close
my eyes, do I really hear better? Can I hear
into the distant pinion forest, the silence that gathers
there in spiraling trunks? Can I hear
past that into the vaster silence of mesa?
To the vacant sound of sky?
More than the sounds themselves,
something about the reaching stills me,
brings me present until I am more ear
than mind. Not a single thought brays as I follow
soundwaves to the shores of presence.
Such simple practice, attentiveness,
and yet how often I wander away
on paths of should and want. But now,
attuned, I hear it, even with the river,
this small luff of breath, a living metronome
beating here, here, here.

—Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer