FootprintsintheWind.com

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 2496

What is outward? It is extending acts of love to those we don’t think can return it. But do they not? When I read the work of Tolstoy, Whitman, Rúmí, do I not converse with them, argue with them, carry their being into mine and into my world, returning it to the earth from which it came? That is the circle that conversation describes, yes?635-2025

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He’s the Cranky Old Man In Chief.

:- Doug.

Bent old man leans
farther over a piano
in a railway station
playing lively complex tunes
Someone has taken effort

and time from life to video
Soon a younger grey-haired
man joins in on the
right side keys
his watch on his right wrist

The tunes get livelier the
people come around mostly
stay take pictures tap toes
Maybe this liveliness
changes someone’s track

:- Doug.

Naturally occurring water seeking intelligently wiggly missile: What’s that? A plant’s root.

:- Doug.

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 2495

He tried to BURY us,
But we are SEEDS

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 2494

Hear, here in the fire

Life hints and teases
to uncover what
you will do

Does the forest sway,
today,
to the rhythms of the flame?

It is mysteries
the unknowing
that keep us going

Now we light the fire
or carry the brand
handed to us
to hand on to you
but never to see
what you will
do

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© c 2025, Learning Works, Incorporated. All rights reserved. Easy reprint permissions: 574/274-5353, or by e-mail to mailto:Footprints AT FootprintsInTheWind.com. Back issues available at http://www.FootprintsintheWind.com

Something hovers, a Black Swallowtail to our Cardinal flower.

:- Doug.

Now that we’ve gone this distance together: What can we do? What will we do?

:- Doug.

I write not words and persons, but human-nesses and touches.

:- Doug.

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 2493

Change your scale, learn something unexpected.

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© c 2025, Learning Works, Incorporated. All rights reserved. Easy reprint permissions: 574/274-5353, or by e-mail to mailto:Footprints AT FootprintsInTheWind.com. Back issues available at http://www.FootprintsintheWind.com

Hot chocolate is secret, mystery.

:- Doug.

The seer sees thro’.

:- Doug.

Conjoined to a common destination, we are.

:- Doug.

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 2492

A conversation is a net for catching—
days
you
me
us
relatives
fire
life
cream corn
hot chocolate
a thing thro’
which to wander
a world662-2025

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You say to me, “What does that mean?” I answer, “Your question provides your curiosity.”

:- Doug.

How do I forget these?
Let me count the ways.

:- Doug.

All he really needed to learn in kindergarten—he forgot!

:- Doug.

Conversation is a quest for uncertainty.

:- Doug.

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 2491

We need to heal
We are the only ones to do it

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What ought we plant to nourish the eleventh generation? What throw in the fire—to destroy or anneal?

:- Doug.

Life is better with wrinkles.

:- Doug.

What do we do about the high plateau? Is it only for enjoyment?

:- Doug.

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 2490

The dark and living alley
two rows of bushes tall
a tunnel behind and between
neighborhood houses
where as children
in secret we played
at life in earnest
safe from
and in
our parents’ eyes
What can we, then?

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© c 2025, Learning Works, Incorporated. All rights reserved. Easy reprint permissions: 574/274-5353, or by e-mail to mailto:Footprints AT FootprintsInTheWind.com. Back issues available at http://www.FootprintsintheWind.com