Hope

I'm on something of a sonnet kick. Shakespeare had it right, you know. It really is the perfect rhyming scheme. Three verses; it is, inescapably, the right number. Any less, and one is left wanting; any more, and one grows tired. And yet, three is not enough to bring the poem to completion, for the reader, taken by the constancy of the rolling rhymes, inevitably expects one stanza to lead to another. Something must break this cycle, and so, the final two lines. Thus, the sonnet is fulfilled, and both the poet and reader are satisfied.

Hope

If love, in longing, found a holy hand,

as palm and palm, profaner than the eye,

enfold and follow, as the two demand,

and make communion in a mute reply,

or if it sought a cheek of softer flesh

than falls upon this settling embrace,

prepared to offer up, and so enmesh,

as ought to marry hearts in happy grace,

or if it heard, again, a hushing breath,

unfinished until breathed afresh in turn

by other lips that long for sober death,

when told to love will only be to yearn,

then there is hope that heaven will arise,

although it be obscured in mortal guise.

The Night

Another Monday. This is becoming a bad habit, and I'll try to break it soon. Well, thanks to summer vacation, I've taken to staying up late and watching the sky and the stars. It's a very nice change of pace from the early evenings of the school year, and has given me a chance to appreciate the night in a way I never really had before. There is a wonder, you know, in morning and night; it's just difficult to find that wonder without going to sleep very late or waking up very early. In the morning, before anyone else is awake, everything is quiet, like an empty cathedral, and the possibilities of the day seem limitless, while in the night - the late, late night, when everyone has been fast asleep for hours - a sort of second life awakens, as the stars light up the world and the drowsiness of sleep missed is forgotten and falls away. Both are full of wonder, but at the present, I prefer the night, as does this sonnet.


The Night

The night is not an old man, yet, nor I,
when stars have barely broken from the blue,
to overtake the slowly dusking sky
and bid the final limbs of light adieu.

We two, we sit, below and there, about,
and watch the other watching each in turn,
but little hope have I, a poor devout,
of demonstrating any great concern

for you, so vast in silence and in strength,
and throwing over millions in your might,
as captivated subjects lay the length
of bodies down in somnolent delight,

but I will ever wait and watch your brow,
and take my dues from sleep I disavow.

Dreams

I must apologize, again, for my tardiness, but I was far, far away, with neither the desire nor the ability to tie myself down to the internet. But now I am back, and only a day late. This poem is about the difference between what we want and what we need, and how dreams often serve only to encourage the former and cloud the latter.


Dreams

I'm cast, benumbed, beneath Your feet,
returned to dust, whence from the dust arose
a child's heart with child's beat,
embellished by a thousand little woes,
and still, my dreams seem just as sweet
as ever on the day they drew a close.

Such dreams! But dreaming did betray
desire bounded by a selfish seed
that led my limping feet astray
and turned my eyes upon an inner greed,
and now, I see this disarray
for what it was, and how it did mislead.

So cast my heart back on the course
I left behind me in a headlong rush
to reach the rift I thought a source,
yet barely found to be a worthy blush
of life, for now I live remorse
and seek the simple way in lull and hush.

Wisdom

It is time to wake up. Everything is alive, as we must also be. It is far too easy to submit to the hot sleep of summer, and forget that there is so much to be accomplished. It is a sad life that comes to its end, to find that nothing has been accomplished, but this is the constant complaint of America. The wasted life; the lost time. Why is there so little greatness in the world? We are to blame. To achieve, we must first try. We love to dream, but dreaming is emptiness. Do, and if doing does not succeed, then do again and again, until you find the thing that you are meant to do.

Wisdom

O God, to whom has wisdom been revealed?
Not I, who can contain it, but the little ones, the flowers of the field,

who number out their momentary days

in melodies of soft, unspoken praise,

and ever yield.

Frailty of the Bone

This poem is a little late, but forgive me; it was a very full weekend. Poems about poetry seem to be somewhat of a theme with me, these days, so I pray it's not too boring. As a final note, I was having a certain amount of difficulty coming up with a title, but Pixie Rainwater happened by, and suggested I use the one you see now, so my thanks goes out to her. I dare not post a titleless poem.


Frailty of the Bone

Words work their lively spell upon the leaf
when patience exercises empty time,
and seems the muse shall never know the grief
of inspiration ended in a rhyme;

of agonizing hours worn away
to bare a single sentence from the stone,
or dim desire lost within decay,
and broken, with the frailty of bone.

For this is not the burden; this a fraud,
a fever dream of fair, unfounded ease,
that carelessly erects a grand facade
to elevate the abject from his knees,

while all the words that fall, as autumn rain,
so sweet and sorry to the open eye,
do find their founding in unwanted pain
and spring to life from graves, wherein we lie.

Summer Storm

Last week, I found myself, quite unexpectedly, in the midst of a wonderful thunderstorm. It had been sunny only moments before, then, suddenly, the sky darkened and thick rain began to fall. The heart of the storm never got all that close, but there were some dazzling strokes of lightning and long, rolling bouts of thunder. A good storm is a lovely thing, and ought not to be enjoyed from indoors!

Summer Storm

Deep-throated, a threatening cloud

overshadows the sky.

Clothed in wet, windy shroud,

it intones a reply

in a voice, gruff and loud,

to the summering crowd:

Not a soul will stay dry!

Poor Poetry

Is it really true? The school year is... done. Of course, it doesn't seem quite real, yet, and I'm not sure what I'll do with all my new-found time. The first thing that needs to happen, however, is a kayaking trip through the beautiful lakes and rivers of Southwest Washington. Three days is the current plan. Three days of sun and water and trees, and not another soul to be seen. What better way to begin the break? And, on an entirely separate note, a poem about poetry for your enjoyment. The hardest part of writing, by far, is not the endless succession of blank pages, nor the pain of cutting huge chunks of text, nor the ache that settles into your back when hunched over a little laptop for hours on end, but the knowledge that you will be judged by what you create. It took me a long time to get over that fear, and I still struggle with it, but I have realized that it is not about proving yourself to others. You need only write for two: yourself and God. Beyond that, it doesn't matter a whit what other people think.


Poor Poetry

If words were half as high as any star,
or half as deep, again, as any sea...
And yet, no more, nor less, than what they are,
and half of what they hope themselves to be;

a listless tremble on the lip and ear,
no reliquary left upon their death,
except the thought that one, alone, will hear,
descended to the heart upon a breath,

and if I could enclose my secret self
within those words that I so poorly speak,
then I could cover them with love and wealth,
but I am all too wavering and weak,

so I surrender them unto the swords,
to pardon or condemn as they see fit.
I have no more, nor less, to give than words,
and so I give them meekly, and submit.