Saturday, December 16, 2017

THE HOUR OF REDEMPTION

The clock on the wall was almost dead.
Trapped at a nightmarish distance
from things defined by action,
Fallen helpless through the crack
between impulse and motion,
An occasional twitch of the limply splayed hands
alone betrayed its horrific suspension.

Across its frozen face were etched the symbols of its purpose
In twelve redundant dictums:
"I. TELL. TIME."
But now, each failed iteration thrust a burning poker
Through the case and towards the innards,
Burning away, like so much chaff,
all structure and meaning and mystery.

I alone witnessed its torment
And resolved within myself
To proffer absolution.
For what had driven it to such anguish
And now prevented termination
Was the edict of its makers:
That a clock should run until it dies,
With no consideration for what falls between.

The involuntary power which had compelled
Each former movement,
And entrusted Time's vast burden
To straining metal hands
Was become wearisome,
An artificial incentive.
With the decaying battery, then,
I removed all pretense
That life and work are permanent,
Or that Peace is constrained to either.

Thursday, November 30, 2017

When worldly cares and troubles weigh
Thy sinking spirit down
And all life's sad and sinful woes
Do threaten thee to drown

If yet thy struggling head alone
Remains the waves above
Tilt then thine ear in desperate hope
and mark the mourning dove!

Mark the mourning dove who flies
Beyond earth's binding snows
Mark the mourning dove whose skies
Share space with Heaven's throne
Mark the mourning dove who sighs
For suffering borne below
Mark him, mark him, as he cries
"Thy sorrows are My own!"
a tree is spiritual

in a book
a tree is god

behind each knot
within every bole
hide universal secrets

the shadow of a book tree
is long and significant
it withdraws not
it bends not
and every toadstool touched
turns a wild rose

timely snow lights mystical
upon outstretched limbs
limbs bearing majestic sweetness
in their easy levitation 
and lightsome span

in books
a tree bends
and there is shadow
a tree stoops
and there is fruit

true to see
like thoughts in three
books and trees are meant to be

tree
shouts the oak
what tree
screams the aspen
standing stark in sunlight
naked
shaven
raving 
without honor 
country
kin

wild with touch
cold to see
real in color
russet beards swooping low to brush the 
leaf-cluttered pavement 
mad 
utterly, freakishly mad
not to mention fringe
in their inestimable sobriety
the trees howl
caring nothing at all for books
or fantasies contained therein

Saturday, November 4, 2017

on Saturdays
the skillet used to turn
five pieces - exactly five -
from livid scent to sanguine flavor

and we drew runes in the fat
tracing the oily patterns of our future 
with fingers
on the back of blue-rimmed diner plates
while we stacked cups and silverware 
in the sink
for Mom to pardon later

somehow the oil always washed away
scrubbed off, we supposed,
by the efforts of a tireless immortal who 
lived, breathed, and washed dishes on a higher plane of existence
than we ourselves could ever aspire to reach
even seated in a high-chair

but now the fat is gone
and with it all the flavor
rinsed clean by that immortal,
tireless effort
which eventually stymies us all
that housewife rule of nature which dictates where to set the dishes
and sometimes undercooks the future
though it never burns the past.

Thursday, November 2, 2017

above our world
clouds sit like skin
clumping into white sheets and flakes
dry and cracked
where the sun has baked them too long

and over the surface of this skin
a cold wind is always rolling
there to be felt
though it cannot be heard
since its motion is not one so much of sound 
as of sight
and a vague stirring of the dark
that dims distant starlight

God's hand is in that wind
for he watches over each of us
big and small
and from time to time
stretches out his heavenly arm
with its long black fingers
to grasp us in His icy palm
shielding us from the harshness of unstable nebulae
which might otherwise dazzle or destroy our fragile condition

though we rarely thank Him here
down below the epidermis
where things are warmly lit 
and the blood of rivers running downhill
gives us joy 
to sit and ponder inmost beauty
without counting the magnitude of galaxies
or gripping smooth cold stones.

Friday, October 27, 2017

pentecost

it was the peak of summer
and they were all gathered in one place
the trees
and their leaves
by the stream
waiting for something
out of heaven
a star
perhaps
or a sign
waiting
as he who waits upon the Lord waits
green and immovable

when the sudden moon rose
and a chill fell
and with it 
a rushing wind from beyond
roaring
in a thousand distant tongues
the secrets of another sky
and the breadth of unknown spheres

and fire danced in the trees
ignited by the holiness
the otherness
of an unworldly speech
cold and empty
dry and bitter
unpolluted in its abstractedness
and nothing like a wheelbarrow
red or not
but the effect was still the same upon me
for the trees spun one thousand images
through every spoke of autumn color
and each was
indecipherable in its completeness

though none of them were drunk
as it was only noon.

epistemology

all that matters is
and what is
is beyond us
us
in our asphalt forests
surrounded and impossibly removed
from granite or ether
or either

for now that we are grown
to such great and terrible heights 
we stand worlds above 
our hallowed roots

and yet
still slip softly down
to empty air
on stillborn shorelines
down
through the thick and throbbing swell 
of blood-flecked waves
down down
below the foaming surface
ghostly in thought
down
ever softly down
to listless twilight grey
and shadows half-projected
by stars we’ve never seen.