Not only like
a book
not quite
over, but
the roll of what,
which is waves
reaching a flowering succession which we call the race,
tides
go ever
only
wooing blooms
& that their stamens
will hold firm
when the thunder of foam runs up their
shore
&
I cry wonder
Roar!
The wave that is breaking on the shore is tripped by the floor, and foamed by the one that is returning, which has run before. And yet we imagine that we go mounting as in steps some goal, some higher reach,
when the beach
under our onslaught
is brought
backwards in another flow
the undertow,
and what went before
must regard
the great clock moves equally in all directions
& we must know
how to provide in a timely way,
that is,
to change in whatever way will
balance the great clock
when it has such truculent sons.
So suddenly awake, I realise that we see memory in the future as a goal today, and that reflection is lost in an appetite of its own devising - and lest we live in eternal displacement, forward and backwardness require such opposite power that
Imaginations Roar!
To honour the Soul by fashioning our desires
to the tune of our bodies, that we may give
grace to imagination
by virtue of our mortality
and not be a let down,
or driven to remoteness from
ourselves,
to do honour to the soul
by doing honour to the body
that is, by celebrating our eternal terrifying mystery
with our mortal, mundane selves
through the transfiguration of the flesh
in love
& the passion of light
& the purity of play
When love’s poetry is written just
in words, in dances only
of perfect whirls
we can freely
invoke sheaves of
barley, golden fringed
poppy-laced
bundles of love.
When love’s duties must
be set down,
then into the
hard earth
must our soft spirits
reach,
grappling with rocks,
clogged with clay. Foundations
are the underpinning pain of living love.
But roots, once given,
draw forth an amazing power,
endless renewal
the alchemist’s dream
base earth, turned to golden stars -
this love is ours;
Our season’s set for Spring!
The boulder is hollow & beauty is nothing but.
O eternal mother of all: time gets longer becoming shorter; space gets larger the fuller it gets; the infinite becomes a haze as definitions multiply: all our contracts are in tatters and all that matters is that truth is not a regime. The myriad tends toward mystery.
SHUT UP.
Don’t bugger on.
Make your gift. Be done.
Let us all re-encrypt: the wonders of love,
of creation,
of all life
till nothing at all
is known anymore,
except as a symbol.
The mystery of character,
of personality, of
unfathomable,
inescapable,
relationship,
the mystery which is personal to the ash leaf
speaking to
the mystery which is personal
to the rain drop
listening to
the mystery which is personal to
the badger,
hiding from the mystery which is
personal
to you,
reading the mystery which
is personal to me
contemplating the mystery
which is personal to all.
The blossoms cleanse the dirty falling light…
and good men must hold hard
to all that’s bad…
That love will clean what should be bright,
that dirty falling light.
The single footpath into the wilderness at its extremity: that’s sexy; the twisting step that runs out on the rocks where the surge comes foaming; the track that peters out suddenly in the rain forest, leaving only what we call virgin: that’s erotic, that’s that extraordinarily homely moment of arrival at nature’s doorstep replete with promise from which there’s no scheduled departure, a fulfilling, complete moment of suspended journeying, a reward so completely unsustainable we must flee, we must get out and away, we must live-on; we must journey hopefully, but on no account arrive permanently, lest we die; and yet we’ll carry with us, like a beacon for our wanderings, that extraordinary wholeness glimpsed in the unacceptable – our insatiable thirst for those wonderful objects of desire, natura, flora, luna, neptunus, the good Lord himself.
I rowed a long way home
that was an easy riding
and a warm knowing
that we who are stars
may also be angels
under a strange crown
when the solstice wind into dark
is blowing,
for whatever wonder seal spark
bearded whistle-jabbing
movement of summer’s green
shark-finned swallow sharp dance
is going
is transparent
heart!
That all my life should stand
at the helm of the star-prowed barquentine
of Wonder
and strange islands
would we see
in incredible seas
from turquoise to thunder
and all beneath,
an azure welter sun crash
helter skelter,
would be peace, feeding us with
eternal mysteries and a sense of place
when we are far,
far far
away
Hoist high and hard
proud sails on stays
for this wind is today’s wind
and it sings us on our way
and hope is where our ship is
a day’s journey
in Grace
and Wonder