Friday, May 27, 2011

Sitting at a table selling
jars, full of ugly scolding things,
fifty cents a dirty jar.

A small child works the table
on a long row of giants
who laugh, spittle thick
on thick lips
their voices towers, towering

fifty cents a
dirty jar

what is there to sell?

no one buys
a child would rather give
take, take a jar
for free, a jar cracked
as petals spread apart
as pollen, blown.

Thursday, May 19, 2011

All Things Run With Him

My God walks on
stark plains, cloud cover
and meets me face–down in the earth

where I hope for a flood; I wish
to let go and go
but my God does not release, no.
All things run with Him, and I must
find a way to keep pace.
I have sank down for days within days without end,
but the least of us follow and follow. He lends
His strength to those who dispirited, bend
in the place of His prints—yes,
All things tread with Him,
even we, with the ground to our lips.

Hours - Experiment

I.

Heart, your days demand
a bone from love, taken
from one's own chest to save. Love --
you are a giver's gift, a wayward's way,
a short harvest from long seasons of
well worn shovels, where beneath the dirt
your hours lay. 


II.

Heart, your love is for branches and bracken --
the blackened woods, by which your doorstep, keep.

Seek me out those hours
by which your branches sway and bend,
for it is by your wiles that I tread path by path
and I might know your cast of shade upon shade.

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

God, what do I lack that makes the heart
a thing estranged? I have no faith in love
for love has kept its solitary pace
with shallow steps, and I am fearful now
of that which comes too late--

and God -- a heart? have you not sent a heart? what use
shall come of idle friends, when this, your trial
heaps upon me mountains, and another's pace
would slow my steps, rather than lend wings.

Oh God -- I beg a heart to have and give, to live within
and seek to hold, oh God -- you know
just what I've asked, and how I've made my word as gold --

but Lord, it is an untried faith
that wavers as an untried wind; you seek within
to give me what I am, for we are not
the things we know, nor do we understand
our need to give and give.