It is hollow sounding
once struck-
then resonant, tones
that lean and carry
into the next.
Suppressed by pedal
at breathing points,
only to fly in phrasing
and surround-
taking us in.
Suppose we were
to stay, encompassed by
the echo, inside the billow
of the melody
improvised.
How would we know?
After the first note
we breathe its air-
sway in a joined jive
inside the song.
Even led among
the staves, turning
and taking our time
for crescendos
and kisses.
I find it in the feet of bell tones,
after sorbing the sound as struck and deep.
I see the auric crest at the tip of leaves
in the moments of late summer’s wanton eve.
I feel the arc that bows in honor
of poetry heard, and hopes that won’t cease.
I hear it in the intake of calm
from the instant of lighting, the droning that sleeps.
It caresses the silence just beyond music,
and lingers on fingertips framed in release.
It walks in the tawny remembrance of noon-tide,
and ploys in the finish of our masterpiece.
And sounding the whisper of midnight and morning,
the tolling of hours when time passes, sweeps
away the cache of conflagration
leaving morsels we should keep.
I find it in the feet of bell tones,
with sounds that amble soft and sweet.
Can you walk among the grasses, ornamental in your step?
Unseen, wavering in the flutter, moving with the ebb.
Do you glide among the flushing, hues of sanguine be your veil?
Camouflaging simper, as you sweep through with avail.
Will you pace ahead in rhythm, accents driving your advance?
Pausing, as an instrument, to cause my soul to dance.
Opening a gateway, hearing sounds of air
watching, waiting for a glimpse of allure unaware.
Can you wander through my field of view, as I write a verse?
Something about movement, and a guise you can’t rehearse.
I use chalk to smudge the lines a bit
and shade the parts where I don’t feel I fit.
Fermatas placed to hold the chords in time
while I dance around cadenzas dipped in rhyme.
I’d rather stare and watch the sun in parallax,
circumventing pain and disappointment – that’s the fact.
Beauty walks, and moves, and sings in form
and transits over paths that I have worn,
shows indifference to my charm- my soul in kind
and I have nothing left save yearning in my mind.
And these, the words of someone sacrificed
to life and how I bleed on paper, less precise.
To stand and sing of resignation, it is mine,
and using chalk can smudge and blur the line.
Because mornings emerge from misty bayous
and moss that hangs and touches the sky-
a reflection in glass.
Because the thickness in the air wraps
the sunlight and holds it close.
The moments are a drawl, and a legacy of
stillness waits-
it waits between each drawing breath,
lingers between each morning glory
and rain lily-
a sweet kiss from a drowsy boo
and its momentary entanglements.
Even before the first note sounds
the blues, there is beauty conjured in the
slim to none spell-
and it is some kind of wonderful,too.
Yesterday, I cut back the burning bush
on the hill beside my house.
It never spoke to me.
Not once.
It had grown higher
than I stand, unchecked
for now thirteen years,
and never commanded me
to remove my shoes.
It is recommended
that the wings be trimmed in late winter,
before new growth begins.
The fly-away branches-gone now. Just
fragments discarded on some sad morning
and a rooted scrag in place
awaiting rebirth.
I see no divine providence
or transcription of holiness
in this. Hope will follow
in the spring.
Now, a deepening chill ebbs
-in vain.
Winter is not yet over,
and I tarry in the garden
alone.
It seems like a metamorphosis
of sorts.
There is evolution of the language
in the shade of pines,
assuaged by a sun companion,
the complexities of the song
from her secret heart-
a pastorale,
that lures and covers me.
I become sacrificial
and my tongue,
a voice in the chorus,
melds with the music.
A heightened song
of concurrence-
wrapped in vines of honeysuckle,
floating in basins of still water.
Ringing true, long after
the last word is uttered
in near, deep silence.
The public order
of the ocean,
a blur of mist and foam.
The captive sounds
of marching throngs
so felt this far
from home.
A crushing flood
of tides and breakers,
twelve bars into song
assuage the mystic
caravan singing,
everybody
let’s get stoned.
Shrieking, cry the gulls
above the din
of skin and groans.
I toss a shell.
It’s gonna rain.
I feel it
in my bones.
There is little left
of thread that ties and undulates
through fabric’d whys.
The whats have gone the wayside now
with time – the when –
don’t ask me how.
This never was infinite string
-ain’t what it used to be,
this thing that stitched my words
in canvas, starched and mended-
just as December ended.
So, with anew, fresh double cloth
the patterns swirl
without the gloss and keep me warm
in thoughts subdued
of music,
sweet – the words are true.
As with the angels that caroled
His arrival in stable, bare.
Praises, Alleluia, Hallelujah!
A King is there.
And with the shepherds,
Who worshipped with humble hearts,
Praises, Alleluia, Hallelujah!
The Savior has come. To start
God’s kingdom on earth,
A baby, a birth
Of Hope and Salvation
Of Love, Joy and Mirth.
As with the Wise Men
That wandered in wonder of stars,
Praises, Alleluia, Hallelujah!
We’ll find where we are.
At Christmas, our Hopes revive!
Yuletide, our Joy is alive!
Open your hearts and sing
Tell every living thing-
Praises, Alleluia, Hallelujah
The birth of a King!
********************
While this is unabashedly joyful (with many exclamation points), Christmas is a joyful time. I can just imagine this being sung with brass and tympani.
My hopes for you (if you do or do not celebrate Christmas)is a happy, blessed day.
A very Merry Christmas!
Taps and Ratamacues 