The Swing Spot

Three miles off the highway

On rocky road terrain

Stands a grove of Aspen

’Mong the Pine and Evergreen

The curve reveals a clearing

Just beyond the top

Trail head six-four-seven

We call it “The Swing Spot”

Elk and deer walk quietly

To water at the hole

Set further back and hidden

From the narrow forest road

Where from an age-old tree

Suspended forty feet

Two ropes drop below

To a two-by-four made seat

The glide seems everlasting

Floating and at peace

It's as though your weightless

There among the old Oak trees

Where not a sound is heard

Except the subtle crick

Of the ropes across the branch

Like a metronome, it ticks

And the echoing of birds

Harmonized with song

Calling one another

And even, still, I long

To feel again, like a little girl

This gift left by a stranger

That brought us so much joy that day

And kept my heart to linger

Secret places, like this swing

I find my paradise

And when I’m feeling troubled

I’ve my own mind’s eye

To fly upon the breeze

And float above my worries

That I, alone, can’t pass through

No matter how I scurry

There I find the perfect pace

The pump; my mind aloft

For the world that pushes at me

I push back at my swing spot

Where shadows lay, there, long

With the sun behind my back

The place I fly away to

Where my tension finds its slack