Early Morning

 

It seems

an endless time in my life

when stars shine, and music and light

dance burning yellow,

not quite as bright as my eyes would like.

Tears cloud them,

are ready to water them,

as the summer shower rain

rolls down your arm

confusing sense of cool and warm.

 

So does my heart yearn in the yellow light,

as a carousel turning from foreground to right,

figures ridden or sometimes bare

rising and falling as the sultry sea swells,

in the leaf turning breeze

that ushers in dreams

on the backs of the horses

with their legs in the air.

 

Yes carousel is singing

and sun is burning

as summer brings its hopeful turning

under the leafy shade

where bright light is mottled

and memories fade.

It is the morning we were born for;

it is the new day that we yearn for.

 

 

The Signal Light

 

In the northern forests

near the Masurian Lakes

remains rising above the dark trees

a railroad signally light.

The tracks are gone

torn up when the grey host

threw back the legions from the East.

In the years since then

the forest has crept back

dark and thick

so that even at noon

Sun can no longer find its floor.

There is little noise now,

an occasional bird flung on a north wind;

trees twist and creak

in the thin air.

 

The housing round the light

is weathered,

much of the black paint is cracked,

rust has its way.

Yet at irregular intervals

the blinds open

and a yellow beam

extends in a line

out over the trees

and cold lakes.

 

 

 

 

 

Letter to …

 

How can it be

that I will never see

or speak to you again,

gone from waking life

as a shadow or dream

dissolves in sun.

 

Oh I know

what you are thinking

head bowed in What now?

Brow knitted in annoyance,

but it is you

who does not understand

or should I say care,

for which there is no cure

I know,

but none for darkness either.

 

There are, after all, so many of us

and it is hard enough to embrace

just one.

But I did not ask for that.

Just talk or a walk

for I’ve heard we all need worship,

and I like to think

I would do as much,

share my life a little

if it were asked.

 

But you

You used a poem

to close the door,

turned my own words against me

to say no more.

You did it deftly,

as the surgeon close to the bone

cuts and leaves no pain

at first.

 

Few things move us these days;

the Gods are gone

and goods demand their services,

to what effect?

All is on the screen,

but I, oh I got consolation once

when I met in silhouette

one who seemed a queen.

 

 

 

 

BLACK SONNET

 

 

When I have struck again that still unopened door

to protest the course of cold inconstant fate;

when once more no fruit has autumn borne

as grapes dry up upon the arbor’s grate;

when we find we’re treading on the nurtured seedlings

we’d sowed upon the ground, victims of a wide neglect

that increasingly does abound;

when I o’er hear the petty minds and common greed,

that determine the rules and rulers of our state,

and finally see that proffered union of mankind

is but false comfort confessed too late,

then do I submit to black despair and turn into my art.

Even your face whose light I’d sought to share

can now but shade this heart.