Six Poems
from Spokes of the Wheel
the orchard where I store my memory
the orchard where I store my memory; citrus-
bright of a pierced morning— mine— and only
this; palm sized lemon, carried over Alps of mind;
that to exist
requires brightness, truth, a good rind,
the ability to wound
all day I dream a diagram of
all day I dream a diagram of waking:
I pry open eyes and promise them
the prize of sight, of seeing, this one
bright jewel of being— all colors
in the grass or lost in infrastructure. hold me
still here. and what else; alert as a rabbit
in thornbright thicket, knowing awareness is
as prayers is, as prey is, alert
to every flicker, movement, color,
each heart in the whole world blinking, awake,
awake.
red breasted grosbeak
the old, amicable prayer of an animate world—participate
the equation of of
it’s worth it to examine
the equation of “of”;
the crucible of grief, grief’s crucible
worth it to examine of’s equation
what an apostrophe might claim
to make right in the line’s
internal architecture, beat
structure, direction;
love’s arrow, arrow of
the mystery of times arrow
rain, harder than a prayer
every thing holds a key
every thing holds a key
for every other thing, this
is crucial. this
is a triangle, north
of mercy, this
is the oval egg
where mercy laid waste
and, wasted, layed
down her altar. this is where
the silent witness speaks,
if you can make her,
if you can listen.
if you can listen you can find
where to find the key that holds
each thing in place, as if
each thing could have a place. this
it is the egg mercy laid, that first frost,
that first communion.
every thing holds
a key for every
other thing, this
is crucial, this
triangulates each thing
each placed thing
is the triangle’s vast
sacrament.
you might ask what happened to the egg.
the egg got lost.