The Everything in the Everyday
Half-frozen mud, cold bracing air
A wind that makes my neck aware
That leaves torn from the tree will die
These poor gray strays who tumble by
And like the ghostly light I seek
The morn recedes behind the line
Only of chance to risk a peek
At drifting lives
Like yours
And mine
(“Aware” – 11-19-2014)
The hallowing of hollowing,
A process I know well:
I filled myself with nothingness,
And grew too proud to tell –
I thought my sorrows justified
The moments that I stole;
But then, the truth intruded on
What was left of my soul —
I know the emptiness I’ve lived,
I feel the keening lack –
But now, my eyes have seen the truth:
There is no going
Back
Boys lose much
The day they first learn
Not to cry
When I was still a hopeward boy,
I’d often dream of flight
Out past the clouds, into the stars,
And everlasting night.
I dreamed of beauty pure and cold,
And music in the spheres,
But destined I was not to be
Among the rocketeers.
The sun now bothers tired eyes,
The night I hold at bay;
The cycles of the earth go by,
I miss them, either way.
For now, I float in metaphors,
And live in seminars —
But cannot, even in my dreams,
Get back into
The stars
Along the Cliffs of Dolor
I saw, through mists of rue,
A figure circumpolar
That always stayed in view.
A lurking constellation
That hung both day and night —
Bright sorrow’s steady station:
It’s never out
Of sight
Her world is torn and leaking,
Every cloth and flag and pall —
She lays down on a bed of leaves
To think about it all
To think about it all, and find
She’s on a beaten track —
The world is like a carousel:
It always just comes back
It always just comes back, no matter
How far she goes, seeking:
And there’s not much for her to hold,
Her world is torn
And leaking
the lightest hand across your back,
or held within a deep embrace;
if i could join you in this grief,
i’d cross the coldest depths of any space
i know the light and dark are mixed,
our longest times are still so brief;
and though my love is poor, at best,
i’ll give you all i have to help this grief
the light and dark are mixed and we
must hide our eyes as at our birth;
but let me be a shield for you
if only for a moment on this earth —
if only for a moment on
this earth
