a prayer - a poem inspired by the roofless church in new harmony, indiana

Perhaps it was the wings of the dove

Beating the airs and conquering them,

Able to move from Heaven to Earth

And returning again with ease,



I sat in an open air temple once

Squared in a great expanse,

Walls but four feet high

With no roof, just the vaulted dome



In the nave, a sculptured dove

Graced the altar of stone

Beneath an inverted flower-bud

Which cast the shadow of a mature Rose



And there in the shadow of the Rose

I made my silent prayer

I prayed for understanding and Peace

Perhaps ignorant one could have both



And just as the boundary walls

Marked off the sacred territory

From the surrounding wild countryside

And the Rose’s shadow caught my supplication...



My prayer vanished into the ether

The vast dome Round,

And I had faith it had reached it’s destination

As a child can find his way home…

we, in a meadow - a poem

The meadow was not green we tread, but brown,

I suppose the season was fall, beneath the Capricorn Sun

There were stalks laid over where others before us

Had traversed, how long, how long, we didn’t know



The windswept trees showed the wind moved East

While the grand River below eddied along in its current

Slowly eroding the silt the ancient mound builders had left

When they left so long ago….



As we moved further in, to the forest

Our backs lined with the thistles from dead flowers

The Sun began to fade and the day moon popped up

Hovering over a sycamore tree, heralding a new eve



There in the trees, deciduous and new

We felt the dew of the night raining down through the leaves

Unafraid of the appearance of sprites, or the gas of swamps

We trudged further in, unafraid, only naturally vigilant



Night was in full bloom now, the air warmer with swamp dew

trees made the sky opaque, just silver bits of Moon shining through

we had made a pact to make our destination

whether in one half hour or whether it took all night



hiking through foothills, finally the deep pool in the center

appeared as silver as a quarter in the hand, gleaming

we let go our packs and undressed to our shorts and tops

and dove into the cool, cold water, depending on how deep we dove.



No other reason for our secret destination.

Just children living vicariously without even knowing

Unafraid, uninhibited, we made our way back, now stronger

As each journey will do, make one stronger that is….



Sleep, sleep, now in our homes separate, apart,

But friends’ dreams often overlap when children,

And the next day we still held hands

As we made our way to school,



Best friends, lovelocked forever, now more dangerous

Than any pond in a forest…..dangerous as a love of thirty years,

That is.

what falls through the cracks - a poem

What falls through the cracks

Are the bits we should pick up and observe

A glimpse only in a reflection of a mirror

A slightest sigh between words almost not spoken



These are the half-lives we always must lead

That we can’t fully take it all in,

That we never know what was around the corner we turned

How memories compress into what we consider meaningful



Leaping like does through our field,

Our thoughts constantly racing to some future

Promising to be brighter, Brighter in some new Sun

That will lighten our Tropic in some new way…



What falls through the cracks

Are the realizations of the hopes we dream of

The realities that can change lives Now, this instant,

Gleaming like embers in a dying fire on a distant hill.



When I was a boy, I played outside in the yard

In the dirt, knees scraped by brambles I ran through

Blood seeping down the ankles to form tiny clots

And healing immediately.



I didn’t reflect on what I did, but experienced life in the fullest

My very body propelling me forward into uncertainty I knew as certain.

What a golden age to return to, the unconscious youth-years ago

When the lifeblood was rushing through to the very bones.



This is what falls through the cracks,

That if we just pause but a moment to drink in a drop more,

That quiet drop that rings between the finger and the wine glass,

We truly can melt into that same harmony, the rings of singing fingers

And the songs of the ancient spheres…

That sounded before birth, now drowned out by our comings and goings…

O that that song would sing on it’s own…