Poetic Hours Online Autumn 2008 |
Michael Larrain |
A Promise for Wilder Kathleen Some days it takes a lifetime to wake up Before you know it the loss of love, of great good friends, close games and all else save your creditors has already gone down and every corner's coming at you on three wheels before coffee It's enough to scratch you from the line-up But just you wait, little one Wait for a moment, if such a day should come and while you're waiting maybe you'll remember when you were little almost as small as the small of your own back your hands would wander over moving water blessing everything in sight so that mornings could be remade where rivers meet like wild parakeets born of your wonder and dragonflies would French braid your day Your can return and take your ease You can return whenever you please I promise Just ask yourself how anything can be and the moving waters of your infancy will stare right through you and you'll feel like Chinese magicians from the Doo-Lang Doo-Lang Doo-Lang Dynasty just dreamed you up Deep Courtesy for Wilder Kathleen Here is your second first day of spring but now you know the names of things Whatever's round and might be edible's called apple Tramping over a rumpled field's called hi! Now every grass blade is reading you aloud and there's just enough water lying close at hand to reflect the deep courtesy connecting us to the sky Here are hours so sweetly serious it's as though the last prayer in a dying language had solemnized the air in passing Stand perfectly still and a white pony will walk right up to you like the first time anyone ever saw the sea Great Wealth for Wilder Kathleen First-thing-in-the-morning silence after a night of rain Last thoughts before sleep rubbed smooth as a stone Crickets frogs hummingbirds bees Wild rivers and roseate spoonbills Water so cold it gives you a truth-ache Stars so old they sang Do not forsake me, oh my darling to death when death was young Mangoes mystery blueberries wine The earth falling through space taking our breath away |
