I hear a river thro' the valley wander
Whose water runs, the song alone remaining.
A rainbow stands and summer passes under.
I turn around on the gravel
and go back to the house for a book,
something to read at the doctor’s office,
and while I am inside, running the finger
of inquisition along a shelf,
another me that did not bother
to go back to the house for a book
heads out on his own,
rolls down the driveway,
and swings left toward town,
a ghost in his ghost car,
another knot in the string of time,
a good three minutes ahead of me—
a spacing that will now continue
for the rest of my life.
And I start wondering how they came to be blind.
If it was congenital, they could be brothers and sister,
and I think of the poor mother
brooding over her sightless young triplets.
Or was it a common accident, all three caught
in a searing explosion, a firework perhaps?
If not,
if each came to his or her blindness separately,
how did they ever manage to find one another?
Would it not be difficult for a blind mouse
to locate even one fellow mouse with vision
let alone two other blind ones?
I am the Reaper.
All things with heedful hook
Silent I gather.
Pale roses touched with the spring,
Tall corn in summer,
Fruits rich with autumn, and frail winter blossoms—
Reaping, still reaping—
All things with heedful hook
Timely I gather.
I am the Sower.
All the unbodied life
Runs through my seed-sheet.
Atom with atom wed,
Each quickening the other,
Fall through my hands, ever changing, still changeless.
Ceaselessly sowing,
Sometimes a mortal feels in himself Nature
-- not his Father but his Mother stirs
within him, and he becomes immortal with her
immortality. From time to time she claims
kindredship with us, and some globule
from her veins steals up into our own.
I am the autumnal sun,
With autumn gales my race is run;
When will the hazel put forth its flowers,
Or the grape ripen under my bowers?
When will the harvest or the hunter's moon
Turn my midnight into mid-noon?
I am all sere and yellow,
Oh! I am so happy
I am so happy at what
It is happening to me
I am getting Old
I am Ageing
I am loosing my teeth
My hair is turning grey
For now on,
Everybody would listen to me
The entire village would sit down
Quietly and listen to what
I would have to say
Most of the evenings
The children would abandon their houses
Rush to my place
They will arrange the fire woods
Which they will bring from
Their own houses
And put fire on them
'The devil must be forced to reveal any such physical evil
(potions, charms, fetishes, etc.) still outside the body
and these must be burned.' (Rituale Romanum, published
1947, endorsed by the coat-of-arms and introductory
letter from Francis cardinal Spellman)
I am a cowboy in the boat of Ra,
sidewinders in the saloons of fools
bit my forehead like O
the untrustworthiness of Egyptologists
who do not know their trips. Who was that
dog-faced man? they asked, the day I rode
from town.
Dragoons, I tell you the white hydrangeas turn rust and go soon.
Already mid September a line of brown runs over them.
One sunset after another tracks the faces, the petals.
Waiting, they look over the fence for what way they go.
Christ the wisdom of God.
Prov. 8:1,22-32.
Shall Wisdom cry aloud,
And not her speech be heard?
The voice of God's eternal Word,
Deserves it no regard?
"I was his chief delight,
His everlasting Son,
Before the first of all his works,
Creation, was begun.
["Before the flying clouds,
Before the solid land,
Before the fields, before the floods,
I dwelt at his right hand.
"When he adorned the skies,
And built them, I was there,
To order where the sun should rise,
An evening hymn.
Psa. 4:8; 3:5,6; 148:8.
Thus far the Lord has led me on,
Thus far his power prolongs my days;
And every evening shall make known
Some fresh memorial of his grace.
Much of my time has run to waste,
And I perhaps am near my home;
But he forgives my follies past,
He gives me strength for days to come.
I lay my body down to sleep,
Peace is the pillow for my head;
While well-appointed angels keep
Their watchful stations round my bed.
