How Still the Snow
“With all your science can you tell how it is, and whence it is, that light comes into the soul?”
Henry David Thoreau
How still the snow waits springing;
Falling beneath the golden orb;
Collapsing to wet awareness
Then vaulting from blue to Blue
In anabatic crocus hope.
The generous hold back
And wet the saffron tongues
Or sing in joyful streams
Rushing to reunion in the waving sea
Where flirtatious breezes
Kiss them to the clouds.
In life, I too drift ‘round and ‘round,
Somewhat on my own,
And somewhat with angelic winds,
Waiting out my seas’ning and illumination—
The warming of my frozen soul
To consciousness and melting faith,
That I too shall be free some day
To fly and be at one with Light.
Shadow Dancing
“We will find peace when we can listen to the’ deathdance in our blood’ not only with equanimity but with exultation because we hear within it the echoes of the victory of the risen savior.”
Thomas Merton
Around the primal fire
Moves a savage in the light
By a dance of ancient passage
In the dark of common night.
Hot! his naked body glistens
As he swims in midnight sweat,
By the valley Gehenna
Near the mountains of Tibet.
In the jungle of transition
By the Amazon of God
Breaks the twig of lilies rising
From the dark of Maui’s sod.
I can hear his foot beats drumming
Like the sage at evening’s light,
As I strip and face the fire
I must dance around tonight.
And I pray the moon is ready
And the stars will cheer me on,
As I hear my angel whisper,
“Just go dance, we’ll play your song.”
Gnosis
The revelation death shall bring
Will be to know of everything;
And then by all there is to see,
To know, ‘twas always here with me!
Walking With Alfred
You speak of ether, and bid us go.
I wonder if you really know
That dizzy land so near to death
Where angels watch small children drift
In hope delighted like a moth--
Their innocence unquestioned sloth.
And so, I came, to sit and wait;
But far outside that shinning gate,
And note below the awful pain
And know I must go down again
Not only as a jar of clay,
But earthen feet to find their way
From tables where the surgeon’s blade
Made scars one carries then till now—
Still learning why, still learning how,
As wisdom forms upon the sill
And I remember dying still
And look out on the world undone.
You speak of ether, and bid us go;
You even mention Michelangelo;
And surely there our fingers touch;
But I have died and know too much.
I know your questions; how you doubt;
But you’ve not seen, you’ve not been out
But on those streets with dark hotels
Where love is cheap and curbing smells.
I’ve tasted ether, I know its fog—
I’ve been the witch’s captive frog.
Thus love’s for me not that or this,
Some spell dispelled with just a kiss-
But something we must find within.
Can you go there? Then let’s begin!
Worship
How shall I approach?
Do the rose and curling wave
Hint with scent and light?
