As much as anything

An inked page, a lined face,

a trace of last night’s dream.

A dark age, a bright place,

a grace as much as anything.

Canvas 397

Canvas 397

June 29, 2014

Meditation

It’s not a question of loss or gain,

but of the neighbor’s healthy lettuce;

how many veins and folds it must contain

of all that’s best for us; just as the less

there is to test in us, the more

the rest of us, remains.

Like every place

Like every place you’ve been,

you are absent from this,

the very last of them.

Like every place I am,

I am sent from this,

the very best of them.

Like every place we’ve been,

what is meant by this,

will surely pass, my friend.

Imagine a word

Imagine a word deep in its image,

and a page in an ice age burning for warmth.

Imagine a tongue that is fire,

before learning to speak.

Imagine the ashes,

and what they are worth.

Grace

Every star, and fish, and beast, and tree,

we are; and were; and come to be;

we now partake of thee;

and thee, of we;

this life, with love,

in all humility.

Light to light

Light to light, light to touch, light to see,

that we might be angels of each other.

Through the leaves

Ever so lightly, through the leaves,

where sound meets breeze, and hermits sleep

upon their knees, summer flees,

and wonder sees them

going.

Canvas 396

Canvas 396

June 23, 2014

What shadows are

What shadows are,

spirits divine;

your hand, their breath,

once mine.

Canvas 395

Canvas 395

June 22, 2014

Night music

How the crows,

soon after taking flight,

become a blue-black galaxy

swirling in the heavens;

how, through my outstretched hands,

I thrill at the night and its music;

how, so suddenly,

they land at my feet;

how, in a breath,

they take to the branches

of an old mossy tree;

how quiet they are,

among the sheltering leaves;

how joyful I feel,

on awakening;

how gladly I sing

of the deep.

Grace is the place

Grace is the place

where your concentration fades,

and your countenance

blooms.

As if at birth

A child’s rich imaginary world, and you,

wondering what to cook, which power to use,

which potion or dream, as if at birth

began or ended anything,

that wasn’t, already,

everything.

Sky-song and maple

Sky-song and maple, so-goes the riddle,

summer-lap and old-toes, soft-breast and all-she-knows,

you in the middle, light-glows, water-flows,

night-long the bell-tolls, the dew-rose,

the cradle.

Canvas 394

Canvas 394

June 18, 2014

Canvas 393

Canvas 393

June 18, 2014

Don’t just think

Don’t just think, that what you think,

must be thought, by others, too;

think, instead, that thinking,

is but one small thing,

that you, and they,

might, one day,

learn, to

do.

This of life

This, of life: that there is, and has ever been,

but one moment, and that moment is an art of timeless

expression. And this of time: that there is but one

life, and that life is an expression

of timeless art.

These senses

Oh, these senses,

which conspire in the night

to make me human,

if they only knew what I did,

when I dream my way

through them.

*

Note

Like an inked scar on a clean white page, “Scars,” a poem of mine presented here earlier this year, is the offering currently featured on Poets International. My thanks to editor and publisher Joneve McCormick for sharing these lines, which, owing to her gracious welcome, form part of a twelve-poem collection of my recent work in the lovely home she’s giving poetry from around the world. Remember, a permanent link to Poets International can be found in the “Reading Room.” A link to the twelve poems together is included in the “Reference Section.”

Even then

Schoolyard dream; scented blouse;

sunlit curls; soft clean hands;

he was a father, I guess, even then.

It just is

It just is,

just as justness

is justly received,

just as justice

is just love.

Mouse in the house

An inquisitive mouse, a pleasant mouse,

an almost-too-furry mouse, in a blurry house,

where the light was low and clothes were on the floor,

at the door became a baby instead, and begged

not to be turned away, and I, of course,

in great remorse, had no recourse

but to bring him in again,

and that, my friend,

was the dream

I had.

Imagine the sun

Imagine the sun

aware of its mortality,

counting the days,

and how it feels

when your blinds

are drawn.

Last ride

Imagine your paws

on the tailgate

and sudden arms

that bear your weight

through open fields

and tender fate

in clover

time.

Canvas 392

Canvas 392

June 10, 2014

Precious

That first hour in the grave,

when you wonder if you left the water on,

and what became of your

little red wagon.

The second hour,

when all of your old photographs

have gone missing.

The third,

when you hear the voice

of God.

And then, the hour of your awakening,

when everyone, is the one,

you love.

Keepsake

A blind well

and a patch of dry grass;

somehow,

she stitched them in too;

in two colors;

into one, present,

and the other,

past.

On this day

Craft, and practice;

and, perhaps,

water, on stone,

neath a gray god’s tongue.

The light, the body

The light the body absorbs,

which is found generations later in bones;

The light the generation absorbs,

which is surely carried on;

The light the light absorbs,

which is the lightest light of all.

Verse

Water, on land,

and your face, the page;

how well, her hand,

writes, the age.

A mist that almost

A mist that almost forms

before an eye that almost sees

what has almost been

as it almost

begins

an ocean

inland

almost

dawn

almost without her veil

So sudden the bird in flight

So sudden the bird in flight;

and how alike, the mind, the sky.

Sweat the gold the place you kneel

Sweat the gold the place you kneel,

where oaks are bones and dreams are hills,

heaven knows, but whom to tell,

what the lone dove really feels

when they hold you up

and drive in the nails.

In a vast white space

A little boy, with a little apple and sticky hands,

busy the spirits about him, busy the wind,

many the voices, solemn, joyous,

in a vast white space,

written in plain white words,

a white ball chased by a wide white hound,

an alphabet of snow,

and you, with your funny little arrows,

ink-tipped, turned upon yourself,

in a vast white space, an apple,

turning red.

Blue stars

June begins with a mass of blue stars

in this little lawn of ours.

A prairie’s worth of ants and bees

within a few square feet.

Should I say more

when this is so complete?