The Music

 

Rodriguez

Rodriguez

singerAfter a long day of lifting stuff,
yanking, piling, dragging stuff,
shriveled and bent
from carrying the weight of the world
alone,
I wander in, set down the load,
and lose myself
to the music.

Look around
Watch the sun-break of song
erase lines of toil
from young again faces
As the master weaves waterfalls
and sounding whales
with threads of footfalls measuring time
for the music.

Memories, like autumn leaves
on the sighs of wind in trees
long ago cut and made into paper,
dance a flurry about.
As the fiddler fancy steps the beat,
his flying fingers
speaking secrets.
Abracadabra, and the curtain of keeping time unlocks,
so we can slip unencumbered into timeless space
together,
with the music.

Overflowing

I defy fear to look over the edge
from my high climb,
Gripped tight by the spell that turns my courage
into a pillar of salt.
A breeze riffles the surface of the drowning pool
below me.
“Listen”, it whispers.
I hear only my wildly beating heart.
“Breathe”, it sighs,
and my legs stop their melting.
Unreasoned fear dissipates,
and I take a step forward
on the balance beam of life.
“Stay with me I cry-hold my hand.”
But like quick silver you are gone even as I try to catch on to you.

Shed joyful tears of knowing,
Gladly given,
Freely flowing,
From the everlasting wellspring of the Grail.

Sweat stings my eyes.
The work is almost more then I can bear:
dirty, tedious, heavy, and cruel.
Til a spring rain comes washing out my winter of “too hard.”
Hear the sun singing in a puddle of snow,
beaming a song I know but can’t recall.
Round rolls the melody with the words,
spinning a memory
just beyond my reach.

Come the tears of joyful knowing,
Gladly given,
Freely Flowing,
From the everlasting wellspring of the Grail.

Sometimes, in a watercolor world of happenstance,
the shapes run together just right,
as if a magic hand was arranging them.
And I know, because I can’t repeat it when I try.
And sometimes, in a wide open smile,
or in the passion of the dance,
there is this flame that flickers,
and I know, because I cannot light it,
nor can I warm myself by its elusive fire,
for it is too uncommon,
playing,
like the reflection of stars across the midnight of my aloneness.

Sweet the tears of joyful knowing
Freely given,
Overflowing,
From the everlasting wellspring of the Grail.

A Space to Matter

Here is a  space for us to share with poetry, song, images and prose, our somewhat battered hearts. In creative expression, healing begins. Like setting free caged birds, we can release to the universe our deepest fears and our moments of connection, choosing words worthy of our feelings. I offer the first poem, one written to explain how a soldier found his way home after World War I-writing a journal in the loft of a barn (Epilogue: My Barn burned Down and Now I See the Moon) He came to hide from memories of war, but in this cathedral space, he stormed heaven’s gate and emerged victorious. I call it

The Altar

So tired from dragging my memories,
Like heavy stones weighing me down,
I came to hide and warm the small thing I call my self
In the loft of the barn

In this high place
I observed life- going on without me
Safe while I tried to bury my secret sack of rocks
dark stones stained with blood and tears
in the sweet hay smelling of my youth.

But like an avalanche, they rolled out unbidden
into the strange light of this cathedral
to be tumbled into gems
that I polished into words
An offering for the tabernacle
on the altar of the barn.

Nothing lasts they tell me.
People move on, boards and beams decay
But the words I’ve chosen, symbols of my meaning
Are released as am I.
Free to create as the winds of change blow through me
And to give it all away again, keeping nothing.
Larger, ever larger as the “I” melts away like a dying ember,
Consumed in living

 

 

                                                                                                      Photo by Raymond Lam