she…the listener for gods
often came where they were not
or just had been
sometimes from her Sequoia redwood grove
she heard their thunder voices echo mountained
heard cursing thunderbolts crease high Sierra air
anger sharp as ax strokes blading firewood
in dark drowsy of her morning sleeping bag
she felt vibration beneath her on the earth
the thudding of their charge as they chased
crashing through the forest or were chased…
heard their deep rasped breathing…later
found fresh prints of their padded feet
they rushed sighing through pine branches
brushing there invisible with their whispering,
and they left hieroglyphs with cryptic meaning
for her to scry in ash and embers of her campfire’s
blazing crackling tongues of blue gold lift
up to the clank and whistle of far distant stars
as she…the listener for gods…she bat like
heard presence of their ultrasound that
often came from where they were not…
or where they just had been
Bonnie Marshall
Artwork by Andrew Wyeth
Proem... 
A lot of trochaic wonder here, and assonance, and deft refrain.
I like especially the rhythm of your pentameters, which often make us forget the iambic beginning and use the feminine end-foot as a trochee. You remind me what actual poetry sounds like, Bonnie. And so good-spooky …
I’m so grateful for your analysis, Ward. Very appreciative…good friend.
Simply stunning!
That you should think so is heart-warming for me, dear Nancy.
I heard and saw something similar the last time I was in the high sierras and it was either the altitude, the rumbles of an earthquake, the effects of too much Johnnie Walker the night before, or a combination thereof 🙂 However, all-in-all, I prefer your poetic version of events.
Ah, well, Malcolm, I’m thinking we’re all too insulated from wilderness…yet what’s important is that we experience/ed it. And I appreciate your thoughtful words. Smile.