Halfway to Silence (3 page)

What healing sacrament

What ritual invent

And quietly perform

To bring life back and make it warm?

Another day a letter

Might tell you I am better,

The invalid has taken

Some food, is less forlorn and shaken.

But for today it’s true

That I can hardly draw

A solitary breath

That does not hurt me like a little death.

II

Jealousy

When I was a child

I walked a forest floor

Charred black after the great trees burned.

The air was acrid.

Among old roots the fire still crept.

Sometimes a small blue flame

Licked at the soles of my feet,

While overhead

Birds hunted their nests.

Fifty years ago

I saw what it means to burn.

I met the destructive flame,

But only now I am old

Have I come to know

Its name.

Control

Hold the tiger fast in check

Put the leash around his neck.

Make it known a growl will tighten

The collar. Browbeat. Frighten.

Set the tiger on a tightrope.

Make him walk it, make him cope.

Punish any slightest fumble.

Make him walk it. Watch him tremble.

Yours the power to use or not

Once the fierce soul has been caught.

Yours to beat without forgiveness

What is wild with fear and loss.

You may have complete control

There will be no roar or growl.

But can you look into those eyes

Where the smothered fire lies?

Tame the tiger. Break his pride.

You will find yourself outside

With all those who can destroy

Tiger love and tiger joy.

Outside in the awful dark,

Smothered every smallest spark

Where nothing blesses or can bless,

How will you bear the loneliness?

Along a Brook

Water over sand,

I did not take your hand.

Water over stone,

We were each alone,

In the green keep

Of the wood we walked

As though half asleep.

Only birds talked.

Only dogs played

Among rock and root

In the dappled shade

And moss underfoot.

In the grave place

Could not take your hand.

I had lost my face.

Water over sand.

Water over stone.

How far did I go

Through the thick pain

Into darker shadow?

But I found my face

When I looked at you

In the grave place—

When I could look through

To the stubborn child

Who cannot be wrong,

And forgave the child,

And could sing my song.

Beggar, Queen, and Ghost

I have been a beggar with a begging bowl.

I have been a queen with a golden crown.

I have been so hungry I ate my soul,

But never outcast and never thrown down

Since I was alive

And able to give.

But never the beggar and never the queen

Could live without hope behind a closed door,

And the hungry poor never felt this pain,

In the place where I could not give of my store,

Not a crown of glory

Nor a beggar’s story.

There the beggar laid down his bowl and cried.

There the queen took off her golden crown.

There the woman who ate her soul nearly died.

There buried so deep all praise and renown

That the lonely guest

Had become a ghost.

And there I learned that hell is the place

Where I cannot give (like a barren wife?)

Where the soul is locked in behind a face,

Where none of my riches can flow into life,

Devalued, outcast,

Queen, beggar, and ghost.

The Country of Pain

In the country of pain we are each alone.

Only joy brings communion, the light game

When passion tosses the ball high in air

And we forget Medusa who turns love to stone,

And Circe who knows every pig by name,

And manic-depressive Eros in despair.

In the country of pain there is no defence.

Tears scandalize. If we try to get through

To some rock of truth we are chastised

Like children whose anguish may be immense,

And told not to make scenes when all we know

Is terrible loss and true love ill-used.

In the country of pain we are animals

Who cannot understand a sudden blow

Or trust in a redeemer. There is none.

For pain is the country of lost souls

Which the gods flee because they know

They cannot re-humanize the pig or stone.

What redeemer now could return lost joys

Imprisoned by an ethos, beaten down,

The things made cheap within a damaged psyche,

The mysterious, magical, fantastic toys

Love showers on us with beautiful abandon

When manic-depressive Eros has a high?

For always what looked like an easy game

Becomes too frightening for innocence to play.

The country of Eros becomes the country of pain,

And the beglamored pigs who gladly came

To Circe’s call die in some horrible way

As Medusa begins her cold cruel reign.

Out of Touch

The source is silted

That flowed so fast and clear

Packed down, polluted,

The goddess in despair.

The dry mouth burns

In this infernal drought.

The goddess flees and turns

Not to be caught.

Animal pride is broken.

Children are murderers,

The deprived overtaken

By strange disorders.

The goddess turns away

From cages like these.

Hers love’s fierce joy and play

Not its bleak miseries.

At the Black Rock

Anger’s the beast in me.

In you it is pride.

When they meet they lock.

There is no pity.

At the black rock

Where the beasts hide

Love turns to hate

In a cruel war,

And once it’s begun

It is always too late

To be patient or fair.

And no one can win.

Let us go to the rock

Where the beasts hide

And kneeling there, pray

For some heart-cracking shock

To set us both free

From anger and pride.

At the cold impasse

Tame the anguished cries,

Mend what has been torn,

Bring the animals peace

Where they stand forlorn

With love in their eyes.

Can I do it? Can you?

It means yielding all.