January Walking Meditation in Seattle

When it rains like this I look in at soaked yards and wonder how mole hills retain integrity.

And doesn’t the mound of upturned dirt hide a well-like passageway to a tunneled home? So how do moles keep dry, or, at least, undrowned,

in these deluges? Moles are everywhere, invaders of our civic plats, mocking our property lines (as if they mean anything in the true world

of claw and tail). For instance, at the panoramic overlook where metropolis and bay glitter glamorously— despite the storm, mole hummocks

humbly punctuate the lawn. Each mole cake of rock and soil proves who the celebrants must be— the slim, blind chiselers below the grass.

They survive these downpours; evidence pops up peninsula-wide. We consider featuring the new topography

with a top-scatter of wildflower mix or clover seed, glad the moles aren’t gone, glad the moles don’t drown, awed by the soft, tiny engineers.