Gentle Arms

Last Tuesday, a dear friend and peerless man came very close to dying in an attack on the Humvee he was riding through the streets of Afghanistan. The three men inside the Humvee were killed, and he only survived because he was manning the machine-gun turret on top of it. He escaped with blessedly minor injuries - singed lungs, broken legs, and local burns - and is currently in Texas awaiting surgery. I wanted to dedicate a poem to his return and recovery, but it took me a while to find one that fit my mood. I hope this does the trick.


Gentle Arms

Carry me home;
my body is worn.
Long did I roam,
but now I am born
upon gentle arms
and though my old door,
away from all harms,
to wander no more.

Your Silence

I wrote this one Summer day at Laurelhurst Park. As with most of my poems, the first two lines came to me in a sing-song way, and the rest followed slowly and ploddingly from there. I suppose I was thinking of Elijah's journey up Mt. Horeb, and so the language of the poem tends to mirror the perception of God not as wind or earthquake or fire, but as a still, small voice in the silence, which is yet infinitely more powerful than any of the preceding chaos. As a side note, I unconsciously mimicked Chesterton's rhyming pattern and meter in his dedication to 'The Man Who Was Thursday,' which reads thus: "Not all unhelped we held the fort, our tiny flags unfurled; Some giants laboured in that cloud to lift it from the world." If you are not familiar with this poem, you should read it immediately. Though it is limited somewhat by Chesterton's rigid two-step style, it has some of the most beautiful and powerful imagery that I have ever come across. It is, by far, my favorite Chesterton poem. You can find a copy of it here: To Edmund Clerihew Bentley.


I never gazed upon your face,
nor heard the words you spoke.
Your silence was a thunderclap
that sudden on me broke,
like staffs against the knotted backs
that cut the furrows deep
and terror calling soldiers
to an everlasting sleep.
I could not name the moment
when your standard rose, unfurled,
but when it did, I heard your silence
ring throughout the world.

Ascent

The turning of Summer affords a special freedom; one which is not found in the vast expanse of cloudless days and long evenings, but rather in the welcome release that comes with life's quiet rest. Autumn allows us to put away the frenzied activity of the past months and look instead to the slow peace that resides in rainy days and leafless trees (aided, of course, by hot fires, cups of tea, and the like). It is a measured freedom, but that does not keep it from being boundlessly liberating.


Ascent

Mist on the water, my soul is light,
a quicksilver shadow now taking flight,
to glide on an autumn-whispered breeze
above crimson crowns on the royal trees;
past clouds in the sky, mounts capped in snow;
place stars in the heavens; I count them low,
for no earthly cords can bind me long;
my soul makes to fly and my wings are strong.

The Last Leaf

I anticipate the coming months, I know, but I could not wait to post a true Autumn poem. It's about time we had some real weather!


The Last Leaf

One leaf left upon the wood,
and time once was that it withstood
the shearing winds, but wick and fill
have fled before the autumn chill,
that little breaths can free its moor
and send it forth from timbered shore,
to plot its twisting journey down
and settle lightly on the ground.

Humility

Well, the title of this week's post has a certain fittingness to it; I finally buckled to the conformists and added links to my blog. It is only fair that I pay some credence to those who have provided me with some small portion of inspiration or happiness, and perhaps, through them, you, too, may find something worthwhile. I reserve, of course, the power to add and remove links at my whim, and to shamelessly pilfer them from other blogs. It's a sign of flattery, after all.


Humility

Praise is poison to the heart
that cannot bear the sweet,
and glory nurses gluttony,
when given it for meat.

Better, then, the blunt critique
to tear the prideful down,
with meekness for audacity,
and thorns for laurel crown.

Happiness Missed

Every once in a while, I attach myself to a poet I particularly admire (don't worry, the dead variety) and try to emulate his or her style of poetry. This one came from my 'Emily Dickinson' period.


Happiness Missed

Happiness is often missed
in haste to satisfy
pleasures that, like breaths deep drawn,
soon scatter by and by.

But the grief that follows thence,
when understanding wakes,
ne’er is voided nor delayed
when on the heart it breaks.

So pass not the quiet need
that whispers to your soul,
for, in leaving it behind,
you leave what makes you whole.

Words

Every year or two, I make a brief sabbatical down to Southern California. I do this in part to visit old friends and to relax, but also to assure myself that, despite the chaos in my own life, there will always be some things that remain unchanged. California is my anchor, and the people I know there are sincere friends - the sort that will be just as true whether you talk once a day or once a year. So what does all this have to do with the poem? Well, I wrote it a while back, after I had gone three years without visiting California, and was suddenly struck by a deep melancholy and a desire to see all the people I'd left behind. There are times when you are surrounded by people and yet you are crushed by loneliness; you are missing that true companionship that is rarely found and never replaced by common friendship. That is where I was when I wrote this.


Words

There is sorrow and sadness in all that I see,
as even in moments of laughter I’m blue,
and nothing I do is now done happily,
for it has been so long since I’ve talked to you.