It was such good fortune to get to know Del

It was such good fortune to get to know Del and to be able to spend so much time with him over this last year. Mostly he, Ken and I just sat in coffee shops looking at, occasionally commenting on the changing seasons, the hi-jinks of the passers by, whatever. Sitting with him, it all just felt like we were watching a wide deep river flow slowly by, bearing whatever it did, carrying it away. "Really, they're all just so scared," he remarked about a blustering group of college students sitting near us. Whether his observations were matter of fact, tart or tender, he held his mind very lightly. He was an exemplary yogi, a credit to his teachers and a wonderful
friend.

He rarely wrote poems, but he sent this one in early May:

Immersing this face
In the cool deep sky
A wake-up wash
In an ebony bowl

This skin glistening with stars
This breath a warm wind
Across a pale moon.

- from Douglas Penick