Preacher to Flock (=Self)
I neglected to ask
if you minded Sunday's restitution parade.
So much wisdom frothing out of me
Come! bring your cups and scoop its hoar.
Who trespasses anymore?
As in...forgive us our.
(It is my understanding
that in our modern day
we all keep pretty
much to ourselves.)
No one told me
as a child
that the sky had my back,
that the thunder scuffing distant moountainside villages
was inside me.
That every closed heart
was mine
for the asking.
That we were already at peace even in war,
even with sneers - and oh aren't children cruel?
The worst is of course silence: to be
ignored I find the same as death.
Second worst is the ridicule-and-venom thing.
Third-worst and last (=best): love, love.
These thoughts bird droppings
the page the dirty earth
catching them
...the car windows, the slabs of rock: splat! splat!...
the yawning ocean with dignity receiving them
spreading them in its titanic swirly way
so that they grow, don't they, out
and out in greasy paisleys, onto and into
the very globe and its sky, swelling with terrible majesty
and with the fierceness of time, daring
to be all they would mimic, become the thing itself
become the laughter at its dumb being.
Become the laughter at my dumb being
and I will forgive you your trespasses.
There is such a thing as honesty and if it can be found
in word-splats then consider that to be your answered prayer
your dayful of Sundays
your eggy breakfast your loving cup your afternoon's sunspray
the reason I have gathered you here today.
I forgot that being inside someone
was the same as saying hello.