Where can we run
If the track is gone
Or the field destroyed
Or the mountain crushed
With flattened stones
Melting away
Into water-flow
Where can we go
If the water goes
Nowhere
The stream
Falls like Niagara,
And falls
Not into a gorge below
But off the very edge of the world
Where can we run?
Where can we go?
I have heard it said
that a copper penny floats
light as a sea flower
on the rings of mist
of Dreamland Bay
And I have been told
that the sun
once a golden disk of ice
fired into light
to warm the days
of Dreamland Bay
And I have heard
that silver-needled starshine
pierces the dark
with soundless symphonies
in the silence of the nights
of Dreamland Bay
And I have wanted
all of my life
to be sailing white ships
on singing seas
to the shores
of Dreamland Bay
Water-mirrored cool
Upon the desert sand
Beckons the constant dream:
The undiscovered land
Oasis or mirage?
We cannot help but think
And yet we cannot quench
Our thirst unless we drink
Of that fresh shimmering pool,
The light on desert strand
That lures us on to seek
The undiscovered land
I walked upon the moors today
And breathed the heather-scented air
for we spoke of the rare Brontes
and wild and lonely Haworth
where in Emily’s and Charlotte’s hearts
Heathcliff, Cathy, and brave Jane Eyre
were born into reality.
All that was needed to spirit me
to those far moors
and purple-flowered hills
was our remembering ecstasy
O, yes!
Today I strolled the moors
and lived
with heather-scented air
Sometimes the moon
With full and radiant face
Smiles down upon
The quiet secret place
And sometimes stars
Surprised from reaches dark and wide
Peer sparkling
Where the wonders are
And sometimes,
(O, this is best of all)
You, my friend
See and share
What fairy gardens flower for me.
Iron dawn
rolls
out
flat
Unpatterned
rumbles
into
the
colossal
caldron
of
mogul
day
The molten metal consumes all
And when the run is done
nothing is left
but emptiness
and
the
cold
brass-lined
sky
I see your star light
(a gift for me)
brilliant dewdrop
in the heavens’ sea
Scientifically
we know
you may have burned out
in super-nova final flare
and vanished
many eons ago
But for me
your scintillating light
time-traveling the destined flight
still bright
shines and shimmers
in the starry sea of night
When wind
Is right, there blows
Across the bright lit sky
A fleet that challenges the moon:
White ships
Float eastward…clouds, shadow and light
As galleons advance
The war—when wind
Blows right
I can at times admit some faults,
Released from prison-secret vaults,
And then repentant cry.
But not all.
Never all.
Pride that goes before the fall,
The small, the mean iniquity
And other sins which I
Do not wish myself to see
Still between the Light and me.