That Road, Again

Wandering, wandering, wondering, walk,
Places and pathways to no place at all,
Curse to the calendar, curse to the clock,
Timekeeping distracts and casts a pall,
On pacing and thinking and taking stock,
To be walking awaking whatever befall.

Footfalls press on through the underbrush,
Unsteady the footfall that knows not its lot,
Backwood brambles, entangle and crush,
As clothing and hair, even skin are caught,
Then pause as a clearing whispers a shush,
In silence and solitude will my soul be taught.

Musing, mine eye, did spy a familiar path,
A passage neglected, like a long lost friend.
Evaded through the storm and its aftermath,
Now it freshly compels my soul to attend.
A hard climb, where grace tempered in wrath,
Redeems! For in penance the path I'll ascend.

Of those days where my feet had but strayed,
A wanton wandering in the dark night of my soul.
Are such days ever lost? How are they weighed?
Are they but flotsam floating on life's rocky shoal?
Such stumbles — the place where grace is conveyed,
The floundering footsteps of beloved young foal.

Wandering, wandering, wondering, walk,
Places and pathways to a place never seen,
In communio, in presence, my steps in lock,
Even while walking in that space in-between,
Walking soul soars-crying like a mystic hawk,
In body, in blood, on a path long foreseen.

Footfalls press on...

Human Soul

A human soul is far too constrained a space,
To nurture love and tend to cold disdain,
Harboring hatred will usher in the reign,
Of those  angels far removed from grace.

Ah sweetness, such lightness of being,
The endless acceptance of joy and praise,
Yet fragile and prone to a sad malaise,
And to a cold and wanton way of seeing.

A human soul is a gifting far too fragile,
At every crack its windows leak in tears,
At every doubt it trembles in its fears,
'Til all hopes are stifled and are futile.

First, the tender words will fail their flow,
And kindnesses become sore endangered,
Fields scorched that once blooming flowered,
Now a place where nothing green can grow.

A  human soul is a gifting beyond measure,
Forged in love —a facet of the face of God,
Both priceless diamond and scurrilous fraud,
Reflecting bright whatever be its treasure.

And when the covenants are all betrayed,
'Tis a dying of the one time verdant canopy,
A state of babel and a rabid  entropy,
The perfect space to be mortally afraid.

My human soul — a place vacated by  amour,
Yet cherished  more than I can understand,
Such is the pity,  for I can be but a man,
Content to be with my Lord and troubadour,

A human soul.

Awakening

Coolness of night cedes to coolness of day,
For endless stars and worlds and galaxies,
In grand ballet of gravity and dark matter,
Gently sway the earth and we into a ray,
Of morning's purgation.

First light — kin and beasts — old or spry,
Summon sleeping spirits from roaming reverie,
From places of pains, joys, and chimeras.
Beings demur as the morning luster belies,
Sleep's spectral evasion.

Dew dampened drafts, deep in bronchioles,
Move spirits and bodies in restoring stretches,
Morning sprites ruffle hair and encrust eyes,
As our souls return from their Elysian strolls,
Wobbling before Sol's invasion. 

Wonder — these morning  rites with no regard,
To joys or pains of bodies and souls  —  unfold,
Stubborn as birth and death and love and hate,
Be life a bitter herb or life as sweet as nard,
Aurora balances the equation,

In the awakening.

Here Again

Ever present, this ghost haunts the places,
The dusty corridors of a tired mind.
The flashes of joy that pang in doubt,
Ever shut my lids as I recall your faces —
Your love professed in a greening park,
Your rage that I was not more, much more.
Love's every grace ends in disgraces,
There again.

Ever knowing, I'll walk in clouds no more,
Hubris to sip sweet nectar with the gods,
Expecting my love to heal the wounding,
Banished from heaven, ne'er again to soar.
Our vows, now become tired old words,
Our brittle hearts crack like old porcelain,
And this exchange of covenants for war,
There again.

Ever feeling, that beauty and truth are lost,
Eyes strain to see — in the crimson dawning,
The paschal blood seeping through billows,
For loving — dying is loving's defining cost.
And though eyes of the soul in monochrome,
Pain in each and every revelatory moment;
Love — God in truth and beauty, will accost,
Here again,
Again,
Here.

Revelatory

Awash, we be, in mystery, in sacrament,
Every sight both revelatory and numinous,
Every photon paints canvases on corneas,
Every glimpse ekes a tad of the luminous.
There, those very leaves in gentle sway,
Bespeak presence past and continuous.
See.

Gently fingertips feel endless textures,
Every crease — both tactile and treasure,
Every surface teases endless receptors.
This, the language of pain and of pleasure,
There, romance caresses a flushing cheek,
Revering body and spirit in equal measure.
Feel.

Birdsong or baroque warble ear bones,
Every wave both euphoric and melancholy,
Every pitch agitates air and souls alike.
The stuff of wind is both Spirit and holy.
There, a bard attends to a feathery muse,
A melody of love, life, and youthful folly.
Hear.

Salty, sour, umami, and every sweetness,
Every savor both chemistry and charity.
Flavors form friendships with kin and stranger,
Every meal a place for bonds and for levity.
There, lips and tongue squint eyes and face,
As taste drops the veil for a moment of clarity.
Savor.

As every breath  inhales endless exhales,
As endless stories echo upon the breeze,
Our narratives, joys and tears ever enmesh,
As the stuff of our lives in perpetual reprise.
There, my heart breaks in the morning light,
The cost of the angel and the man ill-at-ease.
Muse.

Awash we be, in beauty, in sacrament.

This is Love

                                                                          

















Love, pain, and sorrow
Many fibers criss and cross
As the past taints tomorrow
Life is a weaving of such loss.

Though the shoot is fragile
And the wick smolders
I will to walk the extra mile
And love though life is colder.

In woe, new hope enlivens
The dark sees a new light shine.
As life unfolds — love awakens
To the only one I call mine.

Many waters, many deaths
Cannot quench the burning flame
From the vows to my last breath
It will endure the pain and shame.

This is love,
My Rose,
My Abigail.
My sorrow

Many fibers criss and cross
As the past taints tomorrow
Life is a weaving of such loss.


** I wrote this in 1999. I found it by accident when cleaning up some files. My marriage to Abigail is ending in divorce now. Seeing this poem from 1999 is yet another reminder of the long journey of pain we've been through. It's my deepest sorrow that we never found light on the other side.

Unknowing

Dusty rose tints the billowing grey,
And the day bends into the night,
Like blood in water in still time,
Muses whispering a passion play.

And rain rent from drying clouds,
Shimmers crystalline in fading skies,
And rose tints ferment to wine,
As evening robes in darker shrouds.

King Sol, wounded, winces crimson,
And piercing once last the orchid veil,
His shafts of light like bolts extend,
'Til the night-watch prevail, imprison.

As the last embers of day smolder,
And Queen Luna ascends the sky,
Blue light beckons to lovers and poets,
Numinous whispers to every beholder.

And the wolves pine in moonlight howl,
For few sons and daughters of men,
Will gaze skyward with mouth agape,
So miss such beauty as they strowl.

Unknowing.