To My Wife in Mourning

bright day,still birds, black
spots on the blue sky, slightly
sway in trees, and wait

for winter to stay
or summer at last to come
like we’re waiting for

the pain to stop, death
to give way to the winter
sun’s soft, warm embrace.

(for our son, Brian, 3/4/1986 - 3/25/2017)

Redwoods at Dawn

House Amongst the Redwood Trees: photo by Frank Schulenburg, 2012

Shafts of night rising

from earth, climb past my front door,

shade my window, vault

past the high arch, lift

the sky with narrow rings of

never-ending green

as golden morning

crowns with light; excited birds

sing out graven night.

(11 January 2014)

Night Scene

Black windows frame dark
folded drapes; indifferent
stars peer through high arch.

Wine glass gleams. Fragrant
constellations, red dregs, swill
over empty stem.

Night trains blare, despairing
gates clang, steel wheels crease dark rails.
Night birds stir, dreaming.

lands unknown

soft days, warm nights, life
flows into life, seasons melt
to hazy light; hold tight

my love, and don’t let
go! for together we’ll jour-
ney to lands unknown.

risk

"Sooner or later . . . we have to risk everything in order to gain everything. We have to gamble on the invisible and risk all that we can see and taste and feel.” Thomas Merton

Soft autumn breezes,

hills: brown, blue, violet - black

moving to nothing.

risk it all, keep no-

thing in your hand; grasp thin air

and take everything.

taste your fears, salt-tears

sting your eyes; glare like the sun-

set on the last day.

Spring Storm

towers fill the sky
wind-washed, waves surging, seaward -
mountains, living green!

running away, fear
filling the edges of sight;
throat tightens on knives.

hope wanes; vain night fails
never; dawn insinuates
another raw day.

Fog at Dawn

“We are living in a world that is absolutely transparent, and God is shining through it all the time...He is everywhere, He is in everything, and we cannot be without Him.”  Thomas Merton

Morning fog softens

spreads through the bare trees, muffles

the cries of the birds.

Edges blur, rounded

fog,  logic of cloud earthbound:
faith betrayed and drowned.

The Quarrel

"Let no one hope to find in contemplation an escape from conflict, from anguish or from doubt." Thomas Merton

* 

Words spoken drift like

mustard gas, doubt burning like

webs, unexpected

spiders brush my ears,

slip into my eyes as blind-

ly I rush away.