Sunday, March 31, 2013

Thunderstorm on Easter Morning


Easter morning
sings green
allelujah.

while rising storm
stacks up night

and bright as glory
lightning strikes

and thunder
rumbles

and rain
delights.

Saturday, March 30, 2013

Through Bright Morning I Run

Through bright morning I run,
eyes brimful with green love
as the silver world sings

of golden spring,

and through azure noon I love
how joyful psalms, bird-throated, rise
from verdant hills.

But when the long day ends,
in bright window framed
I see
your dark door.

I will not fear the velvet night.
for in the burning stars,
I see your eyes; in hushed
delta breeze,
I hear your voice
calling me.


Wednesday, March 27, 2013

A Simple Question


“While I am asking questions which You do not answer, You ask me a question which is so simple that I cannot answer. I do not even understand the question.” Thomas Merton, A Merton Reader,

“And He continued by questioning them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’” Mark 8:29

Clear day
golden sky
gives way to
black clouds
and I ask,
“why?”

It’s a child’s question.

Within cities
hard edges, pavements
grey receive the red
tide, heads fall
and lives split open,
spill into
gutters fill,
sewers, fill
the sea,
and like a
persistent child
I ask “why?”

In the morning
through bright
windows I see how
spring leans
to summer, timid
leaves open wide
glow in silver light
and green fire
fills the wood,

and by this beauty
silenced,
I hear
in tones
beyond my hearing
a simple question;

“who?”

Monday, March 25, 2013

Crucifixion



I think of you
on this quiet day
as I walk
through  grass
under skies grey.

On the cherry tree
I  touch hard crowns
poised to burst
to new fruit
hard and round
for fierce
mockingbirds
to devour.

But this is your hour.

On another tree
you wait for me
as burning skies
blast your eyes
and living blood falls
in bitter drops
to sacrilegious ground.

O, lift your dying gaze
to heaven’s bright gate!
Pull forth flowing faith
from your soul’s
deepest core.

Though you seem
to be all alone,
I’ll pray for you
at last to find
the golden way
to go back home;

for the Father hears
every prayer
and opens
every door.


Saturday, March 23, 2013

Three Intimations


My tree is still bare 
though tender 
buds flare.

The mockingbirds know.
They fall on robins, 
fiercely cawing.

White cranes rise,
face the sun,
and flash fire.

Song of Spring




Lusty old bird squats
on branch, bends backward knees and
bawls his song of spring.

Sunday, March 17, 2013

The Song of New Leaves

In the broad afternoon
high in the tree, they come
they come by the dozens
and sing, they all
sing the song of
new leaves,  
they come, the blackbirds
with red wings, brown
birds with striped wings
they sing, their orange
breasts bursting,
blue wings spreading
wide, enfolding
they sing
while high in the tree
the white dove moans,
swaying in the breeze,
high
oh! high
in that moon-struck tree
she moans
to the moon
nearly consumed
by the sky!
the sky
of perfect blue!

Monday, March 11, 2013

Walls of Sleep

“There is no where in you a paradise that is no place and there you do not enter except without a story.  To enter there is to become unnameable.” Thomas Merton, A Book of Hours


I
am
here in
this room, this
house,  light of candle,
see only as far as the door
of darkness, the narrow yard, black trees, night without breeze,
confining me in walls of sleep.

Sunday, March 10, 2013

Tree at Dawn



tree at dawn, bursting
seed, rising sun, emerging 
summer’s golden day.

Monday, March 4, 2013

Variations on a Theme


But there are so many
things
To be considered.

The sky, for example,
Is blue today
And white clouds
Are gliding
Over the green continent.


Meanwhile, under the trees
Up Bonny Dune Road
Antennae tremble in the
breeze

While a bird hovers
Momentarily
And dives.

And what about me?
Suppose I’m driving towards Davenport
And I turn too fast
Around the smooth curve
And, seeing the bearded man
Bent over his tripod,
His camera aimed
At the glittering creek

I hear the screaming horn
Of a head-on pickup-truck
And crashing glass
Suddenly fills
My flaring eyes . . . .

. . . . or maybe I swerve in time
And drive on to Davenport,
To the Whaler Inn,
And with my camera
Search for the right shot –
A white church
Against brown hills.

But today I sit alone in the living room
Listening to Mozart , waiting for you

I watch as the cat stretches
By an open window
And stroke her warm fur,
Black silk in silver sunlight
On the dark red carpet.