Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Your Poem

One day
all your resentments and anger will dissolve
your daily concerns
will vanish, breath on a mirror…
your prejudices will no longer torment you
your skin color will have lost meaning
your gender will mean less
the things you had gathered to yourself
will pass to other hands
it will no longer matter what you were
wearing or not wearing
your hungers will cease to trouble you
sex will no longer drug you with desire
your hopes and dreams will be at an end
your opinions will be silenced
you will cease to stumble
you will know only the past.


That day
your worth will not
be measured by what you collected
but what you gave away
It won't matter who your friends were
or who your daddy was
but, who remembers you with a smile
and why they loved you.

One day
this will happen to you
the only thing left of you
will be your poem
rippling like an echo
radiating outward
until it becomes part of the background
a movement, a pulse
vibrating forever
woven into the delicate
fabric of the universe.

Know this
and live your poem
let it ring clearly
let it celebrate something
help it to light the truth
it will be here a long time
it will be what’s left of your beauty.

The True Vine

(Passion Flower Vine and Buds by David Saltaire)


Perhaps you are a mirror
for the poor and despised man
to show him the nobility
that he carries deep within

if he cares to see.

Perhaps you are a lover
of all the pitiless and blind
from your tower of open pain
measuring with telescopes

the mercy of the sky.

And maybe you are just
another wavering illusion
on horizons of parched sand
pulling along the hopeful

giving meaning to the void.

Perhaps you were drawn
from the bright nucleic acids
of our yearning to be something
more than mere survivors

on a cinder from a star.


Or, maybe

you just are.

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Waterfire

“We know so very little about this strange planet we live on, this haunted world where all answers lead only to more mystery.”
Edward Abbey
 

how my reedfence

glowed

fluting, golden,

comforting, familiar,

in the heat of settling days.

The iron rolls of clouds

shone over the valley.

Mountains stood,

breathing,

offering bouquets of  rock

waiting

for the sun to drop away

into nearly sudden dark.



Winking lion sleepy linger…



finally,

a pattering song 

rainchimes

water hollows

made of soft wood

printing soul tears

drumming

icesoft


so



the air exhaled

sweeter than virgins,

pungent time

drank madly

rising Minerva-eye mist.





far off

flash/flashed

krakatoa diamond

white/amethyst/

gray

 fading swiftly

quietly indigo


and muttering.



obsidian shine rivulets

snaked and

pooled

down

the

hills






and even

ladyreno

wearing cynical

neons

returns innocent

widefaced

child

holding the hand

of the biggest bigness

it cannot

not now

not ever

really

forsake.



Saturday, August 11, 2012

She

("Angel With Lantern On An Old German Christmas Ornament" by David Saltaire)


Oh, if she ever comes around


like the sun upon my bed,


oh, and then the field of gold


will lay on green and tender joy.





Now, if she ever visits me


the sky will be so blue


and I’ll ride the clouds like her,


I’ll be rain and ocean, too.





In the heart of everything


there’s a longing to return;


to see the mighty river rush


to join the mother sea again.





My time will always tumble, turn


mine will return once more.


You will see my face again


in the space between the trees.





Oh, now here she comes, now


in her gentle quiet way.


Yes, she waits to lead you out


through dim valley to the peak.





Somehow, you were afraid


now it’s all charade--


things you left behind


fall into bright dust again.





and, when she wakes you, then


lotus or rose, or dandelion.


true gold you’ll know again


as you stand by her right hand.





Oh, and when she comes, now


robes of diamonds, midnight blue,


I will rise and come to her


joy and triumph on my brow.









Thursday, August 2, 2012

Diagnosis

(Image: Heart of Palm by David Saltaire)


I see your poor heart
bleeding, beating, torn
underneath the opaque skin
of your words.
and there’s that one word
a dry patch, whitened and dull
itching, marked with desperate nails;
it needs healing.

There’s only one cure
for the pain of such scarring--
you shrink from it
because all cures can potentially, sting
but you need it.
it seems fiery and distant
but it’s closer than you think,
it’s better than you know.


Although you may have to go far to find it
blooming from tiny leaves of green
it grows in airy soil
and, god know, it’s very rare--
well, when you finally get close
it will open like a soft white rose
and you’ll see your own face
staring back at you with shining eyes
and that’s where the balm is.

(Notes: written in response to another person's poem. The poet wanted feedback. Looking at it again, I may have been writing to myself as much as to the other person.)