Survivors

Survivors

Monday, January 4, 2016

Whirlwind


©  2016 Steve King
All rights reserved

These nights are never empty;
There will be a beat
to mark the waxing moment,
a drumming note to fill
each dreaming space.

But I will never know
if I am hearing or intoning,
listener or speaker;
or if the moment falls an idle thing,
tolling out the faint remains
of conscience staking claim.

I cannot say how any dream is held,
nor how it disappears,
nor whence it springs to hover briefly near:
always some unseen vantage,
where one may not follow.

But its pull is always felt,
and whispers well
of things that I should know,
or would have done,
or might desire,
just so.

Unmetered psalms of my own brief,
echo through the reflections—
all moments that suffice to gather
such a soul as mine.
And all the well-worn hopes remain
that one day they shall bring
a kind of peace.

Were I the sainted kind
I might make orisons of these,
curry spirits with incense,
beatitudes and hope,
even that singular one
to banish every doubt.

But the moment brooks no prayer,
and I must rightly stretch the word
to feel akin to any kind of grace.
I understand:  not every moment needs a name,
that triumph rarely may sustain,
that laughter clings but briefly to the air,
while seas of tears do nourish our domain.

And every moment shall renew.

Even love,
and every friend,
may only for a time be true.

The quotidian march
upon this spinning place puzzles:
every start and end will seem the same.
A humbling passage to embrace,
but should it measure happiness or care,
I know that I shall always march again.

Alas there are no ready gods to blame,
though unseen voices gather near;
though whirlwinds clamor at each turn,
to shout me down,
but never to explain.

A new poem for Imaginary Gardens with Real Toads
http://withrealtoads.blogspot.com/