Incantations would not Work You are a ripple in a cup And call that little wave: Myself, But ocean runs and ocean rolls Immense and savage, ill-consoled, It comes from nowhere you can see Fingers skyward breaking free Do not betray the sea or else It will revenge its moving self, How many rippled cups […]
The Mountains Tremble How many useless words and few: The loving prophet and the fool, For one the Father that He knew And for the other useless tools A fool is like a winter rain That rises up before it sinks With clouds of gray prophetic pain Profound as death before he thinks No one […]
Where was the Wind? She was riding the powerful gelding, Jack, In the shadows cast on the narrow trail When the trees above her, soaring poplars Whipped like masts from side to side Poles on a ship in a switching gale Pitching hard in baffled seas No wind there to move the trees The rushing […]
Before the Forests Burn What happened to the animals after the eviction When man and woman, flesh and clay, were driven out from Eden, Would within, invisible, the beasts of Paradise Wander with a sense of vague and puzzled emptiness? Although the winds of evening cooled them in the shade Would they have sensed a […]
Before the Last Day Along the creek side Where the trail descends, before the riffles Seethe among the great round stones Gray knucklebones A brown Arabian Glowing in the sunlight Fifteen hands high The rider stops then slowly nears As one who steps up to a stranger Imparting confidential messages – It is the morning […]
1927 Revolution virgin-pure Covered now in filthy sores, I wonder what he’d think of this: The paradox of class and war Between the lowly and the state – No servant of the Comintern Foretold which class the Party ate: I knew him at one hundred one Channeled Chinese generals For the International, Tangled with the […]
Saint Teresa of Jesus This present life we live, she said A darkness at a lousy inn – Have you no patience then? Bedbugs scuttle in the bed, God send us the morning sun – When is dawn? This night is long Just one night, a restless dream, It will be shorter than it seems […]
Set Us Free Do you not know That we are seeds in the desert Seeds in the desert Small enough That only stars can see us, Those great eyes? In this dreadful desert In this desiccation Rain may come in decades And more decades While we lie within the soil But then in years In […]
Souls I wish I were a river birch Above a living river, Leaning from above to watch The flowing of forever Have you seen how delicate The branches and the bark? How patient must it be to wait By sunrise and by dark But all the trees in heaven As Solomon are wise, They grow […]
Quick to Live For Alys Thorpe Quick to live and quick to die, That’s how we live say you and I, But even mountains crumble fast Stone can flow and time is vast Look with some asperity: They are like rollers on a sea, They fall in eons of explosion, Shore-bound breakers in slow motion […]
A Hymn to the Sacrifice I saw the truth of it Of death’s imprisonment, A circle under circles In the darkness of the devils Round and round a sphere was cast In the future and the past, Unbreakable and thick Except by flame and candle wick God’s magnificence descending From a glory never-ending – Life […]
The Stubborn, the Blind and the Dumb Take Stonewall and Jack by their halters And lead them out of the stable To graze in the bright green meadow, They will come without question behind you But if God takes a man by the shoulders And leads him out of his prison Of death to walk […]
Do not Forget A fig tree grows beneath my window Yes, it’s true, a fig tree grows, My wife has eaten of the fruit, Green and inside red as rose Red as blood, red as wine Red inside as April, ripe As red bud blossoms or the sky Of summer dawn’s uprisen night A fig […]
Prodigal No need of loaves to multiply, The wheat and oven I supply, Nor flesh compounded by My wish For many now the nets of fish But scarce as winds beneath the sea Master-perfect poetry, Rare as robins on the moon A singer who can sing in tune And so I will proliferate As loaves […]
Citadel It wasn’t just a place to name the animals To guard the Tree of Life To know the good of life and not the evil It was the citadel impregnable, a refuge of the trees A rampart of the oaks and tamarisks Walls and towers made of limbs and leaves There was a peace […]
The Entertainer I saw human suffering Who danced a funny step, Loose-limbed, slow and casual, Angular, adept An entertainer not a clown, He had a pleasant smile, Astonishing to see him so – I watched him for a while He danced inside a shopping mall As shoppers passed him by, Very thin and very tall, […]
Not Just Yet Where the roads you have known and walked on bend Come down this day to the river with me, Where the current runs so wide descend, A long boat waiting patiently Seats on deck, there’s room for more – Has someone used that seat before? You will not cross today but ride […]
Who will Survive? One cricket sounding as the storm approaches The great trees unaware, How many will be down, which rotting branches Will be broken or be spared? All the beetles hiding underneath the bark And under every leaf Will not be shaken in the flashing of the dark Or come to grief But all […]
Such Power Suddenly, over night, Green boughs and yellow The coming of a fragile might And glory to bestow That will not be withdrawn Between the night and dawn But if there ever were Displeasure such as this: No flowering occur It would not be of weakness But of a strength of will Imperceptible Then […]
Mystery Tremendous Doorway but no door And yet no entrance in, Chamber but no floor, Windows in the wind O mystery tremendous Of which there is no telling, People all around us Celled in separate dwellings Will there be release When all has come to be And separateness has ceased? Tremendous mystery Will all the […]
Beggars No longer will you be an actor, play yourself, There is no script to follow Nor will the face behind the mask be hollow For then the scenery, the flats and props Fall down And charming false anticipation stops But truth is for themselves alone, not others, They live by what they’re taught – […]
I Fall to Pieces… I fall to pieces every day, I fall to pieces every night, The maker reassembles me Although the joins are never tight Pieces cobbled from the past Which never worked as well as should, Soul the Craftsman made to last Which by the spirit of Him stood I am made provisional […]
Cloud in Glory A white horse grazes in the meadow Wild rye growing in the sun, Daylight pivots on its shadows Master quick, come Holy One Master come and fit the bridle, Ride, I see the fields aflame, Come and cinch the heavy saddle Mount your horse and shout your name Long ago the ride […]
The Weight The land Because of our cruelty Because of the martyrs of insolence Because of the children tortured, abused Because of the old ones abandoned, exposed Because of the massacres, dreadful slaughters Because of indifference to love and faith Will be wiped away clean Will be cleansed and scoured We are all as one […]
